how/why i got engaged

Somehow, I talked an incredible, godly young woman into taking a ring and promising that she'll marry me. The entire engagement process has been one of the most encouraging things I've ever experienced, just from awesome friends and family encouraging and affirming me along the way and the overwhelmingly positive response from everybody else. I highly recommend getting engaged. I can't begin to explain the journey that it's been, but I can show you how I asked her!

A brief primer: 

From March 16th to 25th, my ex-girlfriend (current fiance), and I went to a conference that the organization we work for puts on down in Panama City Beach, Florida! We went with a few of our good friends and after having a really great time at the conference, we came to our last night on the trip. We had discussed celebrating our "year and a half anniversary" of dating in Florida and boy did we!

If you look closely, you can see the town of Seaside. If you haven't heard of this little town, it's just beautiful. It's the actually the town where the movie "The Truman Show" starring Jim Carrey was filmed! My friend Weston and I went to scout it out late one night, walked on the beach and knew it was the place. It was an incredible option for our special evening. 

We sat down to a nice dinner at a local place called Bud and Alley's for dinner, the sunset somewhere in the background. After declining dessert, we headed out for a stroll on the beach as the sun set!

As we walked in the sand, unknown to Gabby, 3 of our friends were setting up the scene for her engagement, consisting of pictures from our relationship, journal entries, passages of Scripture and what seemed like enough tea candles to land a plane on the Seaside beach. As the sunset faded into the distance we walked up on the picturesque scene with a few other onlookers that were politely asked to move along. This is what you would have seen as a spectator:

While what was communicated there will remain private, I walked her through all the different things in our relationship that had moved me to this point. Different scenes, teachings, comments made by close friends and mentors, all that had led me up to that evening. After I had stated my case the best that I could, I popped the question with about 75% confidence that I would achieve the desirable answer! And to my heart's delight, she said yes. It was one of the most unforgettable experiences of my life and I'm so grateful that she gave the answer that she did. There were no unforeseen hurdles, day of calamities or anything along those lines, just a completely unsuspecting bride to be and a guy that couldn't be more blessed. 

The only other thing I think I would share in this context is just how I came to the conclusion that I did. I think that there were 2 main things that really moved me along in this process and I'm incredibly grateful that they were both there: 

1. The grace displayed in the context of our relationship, primarily from her. 

Gabby and I have known each other for somewhere in the neighborhood of 4 years now, while we both attended the same Vacation Bible School as children, and the thing that most attracted me to her, among countless others, was the unmerited favor that she consistently showed me. This looked different over time but it primarily consisted of sincere belief in me as a young man, forgiveness in my numerous short comings in relation to her and an undying care for me. I know that this example stirs from her relationship with God and I still can't believe that I found someone with that type of heart towards me. 

2. A correct perception of what marriage is, and what it's not. 

As a young man, I'm very familiar with the ideology of marriage as "the death of fun". Interacting with many college students, I'm well versed in the perception of the "old ball and chain". My view now stands that they either
1. haven't met the young woman that will completely change that or
2. they don't understand why marriage was created.
Let me confess that I don't have the slightest clue how it works or practically how I will go about doing that, but I see in the Bible that in Genesis 2:18 that God's heart was broken for Adam on his own. That it wasn't good for him to remain there for 2 reasons:
1. he was created for the fellowship of a partner and
2. his design can only be fully realized in relationship with a wife.

I know that men can be just fine on their own! The apostle Paul was one of the most influential people in history, but in the book The Masculine Mandate, a pastor I really agree with wrote that 'God looks at young men with all the empty pizza boxes, overdue video games and futon couches and says, "this isn't good."' I'm most sympathetic to the young men out there looking for a wife. Not for someone to do their laundry or to take care of them like a second mom, but for someone they can love, which means to serve, care for and protect, while enjoying the close intimacy the marriage bond provides for. 

And I thank God that He's in the process of providing me with far greater than I ever could have asked for or imagined. 

masculine review of "the vow"

i don't know if this is possible to do, but i felt it was necessary to give light to a masculine perception of the newest "girl movie". since it's opening on feb 10th, the movie has grossed a lot of money. i think it goes without saying that a majority of those viewers were women, but this guy went to see it too and i want to share my thoughts on the movie. i've never pretended like i have a great taste in what makes a good movie, but i think you could read what critics have to say if you're interested in a perspective that's highly educated about films. 


i'll start with the pro's: 


-SPOILER ALERT: it was a feel good story. everybody seemingly ended up with who they were supposed to be with and the toolbag ex boyfriend ended up with nobody. everybody loves that. 

-it made me want to buy a low rise apartment in a big city, find a really sweet job doing something i'm passionate about and take my "rachel mccadams" with me. in my mind, growing up in a small town, being a city has always just seemed sketchy, smoggy and honestly, very unappealing. great to visit, but only for long enough to miss a smaller city, town or suburb. a combination of an incredible talk by a gospel centered, urban minded pastor and the appeal of the city i saw in this movie has me itching to leave my rural routes for the time being. 


-most obviously, i was really challenged by leo (channing tatum). sure, he's a physical specimen and i'll continue to work out more faithfully as a result of seeing the movie, but the most admirable quality i saw in this seemingly fictional character is how 1) how much he initiated and pursued his wife and 2) the degree of perseverance he displayed in doing so. regardless of how much it seemed unfair to him, he pursued and cherished and loved his wife. i have my reservations about what was portrayed in this movie, but as a man, i was challenged by this projection of a man that was so quick to deny himself, vocationally, personally and relationally to pursue the heart of his betrothed.  


something i like to do when i watch movies is think about how it relates to my relationship with God. probably my favorite quality to see in a movie is a character denying themselves for the benefit of another with no expectation in return, or defined in a biblical sense, the word "love." leo's patience, kindness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control all portrayed to his unknowing bride how he really feels about her, all for the sake of being in relationship. my sweetheart pointed out that he points us to the character and nature of the God that we both know as Christians, and i really value that observation. 
a key characteristic in my relationship with God, probably the one that has drawn me to God the most over time is this from Romans 2:4


"Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, tolerance and patience, not realizing that God's kindness leads you toward repentance?"


that God loves me so much and it leads me to desire to change my ways, thoughts, ways i spend my time and money, to be more honoring to him.


to complete my review, i think i have to share a key reservation that i have about this movie. 
-i'm coming a little strong when i say that $85 million worth of people saw nearly 2 hours of "santa clause" on the screen. you know what i mean? sadly, "leo" is too good to be true outside of the person of Jesus Christ. something really great is that a good number of those people understand that "all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" romans 3:23, and that they could have been reminded of the perfection and undying love for the world that God has so clearly displayed for us. 

but my fear is for some of those that didn't bring in that perspective, and for the others that have no idea who Jesus is. that when they go back to their boyfriend, husband or any other male in their life, they will build this expectation, this hope, this false sense of reality that maybe an earthly man could compare to the fictional, cinematic character. that bitterness, a lack of appreciation and unfair expectation for who these guys should be would ensue from this sense of entitlement for their own personal "leo". don't get me wrong, i believe men were created for and should absolutely strive to die to themselves for their wives but for support of this potential bitterness, i attached an article of what i would perceive to be a way that girls can feel without that pursuit.  

i could be over thinking this whole situation but i think there's a reason why women line up in droves to see the "twilights" and "insert Nicholas Sparks novel turned movie here." i know that women are created differently than me, thoughts and desires and i'm in no way implying that there's anything wrong with looking forward to a husband or enjoying a good story, please don't hear that. i won't pretend, nor be so prideful, to think that i understand the female mind, but what i think is true is they desire love, a perfect, unconditional pursuit and valuing of their hearts. as a man, i'm completely aware of my sinfulness and inability to attain that level of perfection and my hope and desire is that everyone, myself, men and women would see that we can't find that love in a person here. 

disclaimer: i won't pretend like i, and my entire gender, don't have our laundry list of issues, specifically pride, selfishness, idolatry and lastly, idealizing in our relationships with women as well. 

new year's resolutions

i've discovered that the key to selecting good new year's resolutions are three fold:

simple, attainable, short term. i know that sounds fairly insignificant, but i achieved all 3 of my goals by groundhog day... just sayin. this update wasn't for me to brag, but to expose an idea of continual evaluation and goal setting. i'll use my goals for example: 

i removed the name of my partner in crime to provide a small amount of anonymity, but i wanted to focus more on what i "brought to the table", no pun intended. (we wrote our goals on our dinner table!). 

all bad jokes aside, i think i'm on to something. here were my goals: 

1. "laugh more, less 'i knows'"

this goal was a relational one, in that i just wanted to laugh more and enjoy life, while removing an element of pride, conversationally saying "i know", which just means I would value others   conversationally more. this has been fairly easy to do with an honest effort. 

2. "investing more in nonbelievers"

as a christian, i tend to spend time with people who understand and deeply value the things i do. also, i know that God's put the call on my life to bring His message of salvation to people who don't know Him. i think sometimes people feel like that's an awkward perception, but really i just wanted to be more intentional in spending time with people that i love that don't know God very well or at all. it's gone pretty well. 

3. "build 3 woodworked objects"

this goal was unashamedly a push to become more masculine in a lumberjack kind of way. honestly, i don't want to be 30 and not know how to construct basic things that could be asked of me at that phase in life. i just feel such a sense of accomplishment both a.) looking at things i've built and b.) knowing i have the ability to build things.  with the help of some incredible friends (thanks patrick and chase!) here's a few of my works of art: 

i really enjoyed doing these projects with my friends and being less prideful in conversations, but what i wanted to start to achieve with these goals was to be 1) more relational 2) more spiritually mature and 3) more of the man that i want to be someday. while these goals are small in nature, they're steps in the direction to achieve a vision of the kind of man that i hope to be someday.
so what i wanted to ask you is who you want to be someday. this next week, i'm hoping to talk with the spring pledge class of my fraternity and the 2 questions i want to ask them are both who do you want to be someday and what do you want to do with your life.
i think it's important that we have a vision, both in general and some specific ideas about who want to be someday, so that we can take small steps to be that person someday. my desire is to be a faithful steward of the life i've been given and i hope that the few things i share can help you to do the same.

happy short term goal setting friends!

titus helped hold down the tarp, what a guy.

a family christmas

Christmas, here we come. my family is always one of the first to kick off the season in america, this year with a whopping 8 day head start. while this is true, I've had the luxury of making an observation or two about the season to let you think about as you go about your merry way with your kinfolk.


i think Christmas could be a potentially stressful time for some people. as a young single, i in no way can empathize with that thinking, but as i carried in gifts with my brother-in-law tonight, i saw what it was like for a fairly average young married couple. i heard about the gift totals and travel times necessary to pull off a holiday season and i think my heads and my eggnog drinking mouth is still open. 5 Christmas' in less that 72 hours! more like a Christ-marathon-mas. my point being this, between traveling, shopping and my Achilles heel, gift wrapping, it could feel like your knee deep in reindeer droppings. but here's what i observed tonight: 

time with family is one of the most rewarding things you could ever experience. sure, you may not get the gift you wanted in dirty Santa (earlier mentioned brother-in-law, massive OU fan almost ended up with an Oklahoma state big 12 champion shirt and hat!) or maybe you're not that fond of your in-laws, but i saw tonight a very specific parallel that i would love to share.

if you're a Christian, the sustainable, accepting relationships that i hope you have in your family could very well model the way our heavenly Father feels about you. he loves us so much and he desires for us to feel that. family is a blessed gift that he gives to some of us and it's a way that God can help fix a problem that we all experience. 

"The LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone.”        genesis 2:18

see without family, i would just be a single guy in a college town with no students. but as i sat between the cutest grandmother anyone's ever had and an even cuter niece, i reflected on how blessed i was. that these people over time don't withdraw their affection from me, but just enjoy me and remain in relationship with me. i can't learn that on my own. that i'm loved for no reason other than simply what family i was born into. it's just amazing. i do nothing but eat turkey and make jokes and i'm loved year after year. and in the same manner, i believe that God loves and desires a relationship with me, simply on the basis of joining his family. 

so if there were 2 things i'd want you to think about this year, it's this: 

do you see how much God loves you by giving you these people and where would you be if your family wasn't here? 

merry Christmas dear friends, i hope you drink lots of eggnog and watch Christmas vacation and that you enjoy the contentment that only people in your life can bring. 

 

thankful novembers

every year the month of november offers a few special things: football, great food, fleece jackets, flannel shirts and most uniquely, an awareness of my generally ungrateful heart. after an incredible discussion on the topic with my mentor, i've really been chewing on how this plays out in life and here's what i've got.

how funny would things in our society look like, if everywhere people argued, they just gave thanks for the positives in the situation? really just let your mind go there. in a courtroom, in stead of the case being decided by the disproving of the opposing argument, it  was won by who could affirm their own points more?    

or what about in politics. in the 2012 election, obama and rick perry/cain for 2 hours strictly lauded their own fortunes and what they've been grateful to be taught along the way by others? just 2 hours of why they feel they're the most qualified candidate based off of the incredible blessings they've been provided with?  

what about sports? if announcers in the booth and on tv shows spent time just championing each others ideas. 

as a young man, i find it incredibly easy to drift towards being a critical spectator rather than to be a responsibility assuming leader that believes what's best of those in charge. (even with great friends like these guys) as a football fan, it seems so much easier to be the heckler throwing peanuts at the referee rather than putting on the striped shirt and making the calls myself. i don't envy the guy having to make the hard decisions regardless of how much he's getting paid. 

so how does thankfulness play into this mess? i'm finding that if i'm too busy being thankful for what i have and for the good in the situation, it's awful hard to get stuck on what i don't agree with. am i saying be negligent and allow harmful things to happen? absolutely not. but be ok with getting pickles that you didn't want on your burger. somewhere, somebody's not eating. get over that your football teams losing, football records are the least of some people's worries. enjoy your older car, most people don't have one. NOTE: please don't feel like you're in trouble, this is mostly for the benefit of my cynical heart.

colossians 4:2 devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. 

this gets even better. not only do we get to be thankful, we get to be watchful and thankful. so all that time and effort we can spend sometimes looking for what's wrong, that can be spent finding what's good and beneficial. i can't imagine how different my life would look if i were better at this. 

in closing, this month i want to spend time being thankful for all the good things that i've been given and for Him who gives them. including the great friends that i've shown in this post!

james 1:17 every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father. 

happy november friends!

moneyball convictions

watched the new brad pitt movie "moneyball" sunday night.. great stuff. this could stem from the fact that i like just about anything pitt does, but it correlated with some stuff i've been thinking on lately.

first: i'm not a movie critic and don't pretend to have great taste in movies.(my favorite movie is sweet home alabama) but i'm developing an ability to look past surface level themes and to see how Jesus has interwoven qualities of himself into creation. colossians 1:16 talks about this in creation as both "visible and invisible" elements that are a "shadow of the things that were to come" (col 2:17), referring back to the person of Christ. 

but here's the deal: 

pitt plays a character modeled after a real guy named billy beane, who is the current general manager of the oakland a's baseball team. a reality of the oakland a's is that on a regular basis, the money they spend on players is 25-50% of what bigger market teams like the yankees or red sox spend on players (see chart for details). as you would expect, this     

handicaps them from signing big name players and leaves them with young unproven players. the reality of the situation is that teams with money were the most successful and for years, it was few and far between that the "have not's" could catch the "haves." 

 that being said, beane (pitt) decides it's time to try something new. he decides to try a new system based off a book previously written with mathematics being the determining factor, not the eyes of scouts and what naturally seems right.

and this is what i like. as he goes about achieving his dream, he meets opposition. things don't go as planned and people don't like what he's doing. his own manager (head coach) refuses to buy in and he has to go to drastic measures to set his plan fully into motion. a couple lines between beane and his assistant gm in the stadium offices really put this in play for me: 

assistant describes how this system isn't going to make them any friends and how it's about time to hang it up

beane (loosely) "see that's the thing: we can't spend all our time worrying about what other people think, we just gotta have faith in our system and live with whatever happens." 

while that may have not been what he said verbatim, you get the idea. even if it cost beane his job and livelihood, his dream of making a difference and ultimately changing the game was held higher than the short term consequences of unhappy people. 

this past summer, i heard a sermon by a guy named rene shclaepfer at twin lakes church when i was in santa cruz. he talked through the book of daniel, and as he talked through chapter 3, a story about 3 men came up. the king of babylon was hacked and in daniel 3:14, he confronts these men for not worshipping him: "is it true, shadrach, meshach and abednego, that you do not serve my gods or worship the image of gold i have set up?...... if you do not worship it, you will be thrown immediately into a blazing furnace."

stakes are a little higher here. it's not about being the risky g.m. that makes some crazy moves, it's 3 guys going against thousands and the government authority to keep their faith in their God. ultimately, a miracle occurs and they're thrown into a blazing furnace (v.21) and walk back out (v.26). it's crazy but their faith in God wasn't in vain. 

 a few things the pastor said in his talk is that people are driven by different things, that these are there dominant life principles:

1.circumstances (how things are)   2.convenience (what's easiest)  3.criticism (what others think)   

and 4.convictions (what matters most).

as i'm determining who i want to be and what guides who i am and decisions i'll make, i find that the first 3 guide my life alot. but what i admired most about billy beane and the 3 men in daniel is that they were driven by their convictions. going against what others thought and being satisfied with knowing you're doing what is right, regardless, is one of the most admirable things i think anyone could do. i wanted to share that with you and ask you what it is that drives you. 

have a good one friends

redwoods and big waves

something i'm fascinated by is how big things can be. this summer, i've been so incredibly blessed to be working in northern california in a smaller city called santa cruz. the two things that santa cruz is known for is it's big waves and big trees. various surfer magazines call this the number one surfing spot in the country (i wouldn't know yet, the water is 55 degrees at best!) and is also 15 minutes away from some of the most famous redwood trees (pictured above). we've been pretty busy planning and getting to know the students that just arrived but i was stuck on the trees this morning. let me digress

around 6:30am, i was on my way back from the airport (dropped off my sweetheart for a wedding she was going to). i was cruising down the windy roads in the middle of the trees and podcasting one of my favorite pastors as he talked about consistency in our walk with the Lord. as i was surrounded by such beautiful scenery, one of my favorite passages came to mind. in jeremiah 17:7-8, it discusses the idea of a man of God being someone that can weather different seasons. never fearing because of it's firmly planted root system that sustains it regardless of temperature or weather.

i pushed back and thought of the men i most respected. i can appreciate people who can do things physically that i can't. lift heavy weight, jump really high, speak very eloquently, dance with coordination. but the people i admire most are the ones with perseverance. i watched a movie recently called "the way back". it was about 7 men who escaped a camp from siberia in 1941, only to enter a desert followed by the himalayans to round off a 4,500 mile trek for freedom in india. they didn't do anything fascinating other than move and survive and that blew me away. that's not my point, but what a crazy story right?

anyways, the people i respect and admire the most are the ones who do something good and admirable on a continuous basis. the qualities of steadfastness and perseverance blow my mind. i watch my friend brandon lead his family well over and to consistently give himself up for them, it just witnesses to me. i watch countless other men work jobs and consistently die to themselves and i'm amazed.

so i guess my point is this: as a 23 year old, i'd rather start to be a tree than to be a bottle

rocket. i know every "carpe diem" person threw up when they heard that, but i love that idea. for a generation of men to consistently die to themselves would be so impactful. so i guess that could be a challenge for us, be trees.