Thanksgiving

‘Give thanks to the Lord , for he is good; his love endures forever. ‘

1 Chronicles 16:34

Prayer

Lord, God we come to today to simply say thank you.  Thank you for everything that you have given to us.  We know that we don’t deserve any of it.  God, we also pray that you would be with those who don’t know 100% that you exist.  Be with those who might be on the fence on whether to pray to you or not.  We pray that you open their eyes and their heart to see and hear you alive in their lives. God, we also pray that you help us to gently guide those who don’t know you, to you.  Give us the right words to help them see you.  The right words to help them feel you. Help us not to be pushy because we know that could work in reverse of what you need from us.  God thank you for your love and for everything that you bless us with. Thank you for your son, thank you for this wonderful place that we live. Thank you for the opportunities that you give to us. Thank you.

Amen

A Little More

As I look back at where we were a few years ago. Our life has changed.  It was the year before we started our own business.  I left Nov 1st and was only home for a total of 5 days in the whole month of November.  I had the amazing opportunity to travel to Tennessee, Vermont, Texas, and Montreal all in the same month.

While it was wonderful it also caused our whole family extreme heartache.

Have you ever traveled by yourself for an extended amount of time while your spouse was left to take care of 4 kids?

Boy am I thankful God gave me such a strong wife. Jenna, you are amazing.

It was tough being gone that long.

And boy did it play havoc on our relationship, as well as on our parenting, not to mention my weight (talk about Santa clause. Lol)

The truth is that every time I flew out on a Monday morning I knew that God had a plan for me. 

He was either introducing me to someone who needed his guidance through my words, or it made Jenna stronger than she ever thought possible.

There was this one time we had bought three pigs to raise and butcher.  We brought them home and started fattening them up.

Then our oldest Billy, said dad I think this pig’s pregnant. 

“No, she’s not, son” I would respond back, we have never had her with a bore, ever.  Heck, we didn’t even own a bore.

He kept on insisting that she was pregnant.

Eventually, we completely ignored him anytime he would bring it up.

You think you know where this is going don’t you? Just wait until it gets better.

Then one morning I was heading out for the week. I told everyone goodbye early in the morning and jumped on a plane.

When I landed in Dallas, TX the first leg of my flight. My phone exploded with texts from Jenna.

Look what I found this morning.

It was a picture of a piglet. And the words I will always listen to Billy from now on about animals.

Here’s where it gets interesting.

I am thousands of miles away from home. And Jenna had to figure out how to get the pigs over to a neighbor’s house where they had a farrowing crate.  So when our wonderful neighbors (HUGE shout out to the Peines) came over.

They informed Jenna that not only was that pig going to have more piglets, so were the other 2 pigs that we were fattening up.

ALL 3 OF OUR PIGS WERE PREGNANT!

What the heck?

I am literally thousands of miles from the house and all three of the pigs birthed while I was gone.

You see, we didn’t intend to have piglets.

We didn’t want to go through that process without each other.

We didn’t want to travel that much.

But it was exactly what we needed. And God knew it.

No next time you see a “bad” thing happening, take a step back and say, “Thank you for giving me what I needed instead of what I wanted.”

Will you pray with us?

Mankind throughout the world throughout our current situation

All Law enforcement and emergency response personnel

For all military personal serving our country and their families

Those in Leadership positions throughout the world