Hello readers. Welcome to my heart. Let's begin.
I've decided to share with you all my dreams. I hear that term a lot on Twitter. Everyone seems to have dreams of becoming millionaires and corporate bosses and NFL Superstars---not me. I do my best not to knock anyone's dreams because its truthfully to knock their identity, but whatever, that's an entirely different blog for another day. Let's go.
My first and perhaps biggest dream is to be a father.
I know what some of you may be thinking. "Claude, you should dream bigger." Well I say back to you that you have no idea the impact a father has on a family, therefore impacting a bloodline, therefore impacting an entire generation. In my search for understanding of life, Jesus has beautifully walked me through all of my issues and showed me where most of them have stemmed from the lack of a father. I bet if you sat down and prayed for God to reveal to you your issues, you'll find the same root cause. Oh, this doesn't mean things like not knowing how to shave, or how to build a car, or fix a car engine or how to shoot a basketball. Oh no. It's those hidden affirmations and examples and core training that I didn't have. I'll mention just a few of them.
The first major thing is what exactly does love look like? I've never seen my father love my mother so I paid attention to R&B and figured out it was sex and sex and spell it backwards xes. Thank you Jesus for releasing me from that. A result of that was seeing God's daughters as objects, play toys for this game of lust to entertain my "needs" (Yes, that was sarcasm). Next I didn't know what love felt like from an authority role, so I dishonored it. I had seen or more so heard enough corrupt police stories to be able to throw all of anybody in an authority role in this category of this theology, "You have to earn my respect." So I warred against whatever assumed the role and had the ability to tell me what to do. Parents, the principals in our schools, coaches. So many more, but I'll sum this thing up.
I've begun to feel the weight of a broken family. Painfully watching my own scars heal and further watching the same chains that I once wore are still binding my own family. Watching my family battle with insecurities, potentials unreached, a lacking of worship, a lacking of hope, a poor definition of love, unhealthiness, and the list goes on. But God put this burden on me after revealing to me that sin has entered into the world because of bad male leadership. Or to make it personal, your life has been affected because of bad male leadership. Oh, and you'll find the good news of Jesus Christ hits a full circle here. Great male leadership redeemed the world. Great male leadership sanctified His wife, the church. Great male leadership died for His wife, the church. So Paul says this, "Husbands, love your wives just as Christ loved..." Ephesians 5:25
Men, we must love like Jesus. We can't learn that if we don't know Him. That's how we'll be able to pull of the example of Jesus in our own lives, by knowing Him. Great male leadership loves his family. Great male leadership not only provides financially for his family, but emotionally, intellectually, graciously, generously, and many many other areas. And that is a ministry by itself. I follow some pastors that are involved in this organization called Focus on the Family. Self explanatory. But by focusing on the family I prove to the world that I'm capable of leading anything because I've first done it in my home. You should be able to judge my leadership based on my family. If I'm not loving my wife, then there's no way I can love you. If I'm not respecting and honoring her, then just know I more than likely will not respect and honor you. If I'm not serving my family, then I can't serve you. So the weight of a man's value is found in how well he can lead. Lol. I can't let you miss that. I will attempt to plant that seed in your heart right now.
The weight of a man's value is found in how well he can lead.
But Claude, there's so many other things----I'm using God's measuring system here. That's all God is concerned about for men. K? Let's go into my next dream.
My next dream is to plant a church. I love how God has orchestrated this area of my life in the last few years. I had this vision for A church last year, but I brushed it as nonsense. But thankfully I clicked the Save As button and put a tag on it that said, "Find this church one day, it sounds pretty cool". And an internship later and a Switch Campus Youth Pastor later this dream became more of a reality. God brought it back up one day as "No, that vision wasn't for you to find that church one day, but to build that church one day.
Ohhhhhhh.....
Sometimes God shows us His provision before we even start to believe in ourselves. Or He's just patient even when we're knuckleheads. And the leadership surrounding me that's investing their time and efforts in training me and building me up, ALL part of the grooming process for this dream. But the vision for my own church birthed from a heart of desperation to know what plagues you and me. I was begging God to maybe give me the answer to why are people so crazy? Ok, sorry. I meant to say, "Why are people hurting?" I have an entire blog for the answer I got from God in this entry---Show Them My Son---. But after answering that question for me, God also directed me to a Proverb that says, "Above all else, guard your heart. For it is the wellspring of life." So God showed me that a lot of people are suffering from heart problems. EVERYTHING people do is a condition of the heart. EVERYTHING in the heart is shown in our lives. Everybody that hates God or ignores God or hates people or with anger problems or insecurities or blows up at you, attitude problems, or whatever---- all heart problems. So the combination of this proverb and the phrase show them my son, birthed this mission of pointing people to Jesus so they can be healed.
The Healing Heart Church.
So these are my two dreams. And if one thing I've learned is that dreams shouldn't be reached for, but worked towards. Don't just reach for it, become it. I believe dreams are an outpour of what God is already doing in your world. These father and church dreams are being worked on right now. A loving father had to learn how to love before he showed it to his family---so I pursue Jesus. And a diverse and thriving church cannot be that if the leader isn't---so I freshen my experience with Jesus by exposing myself to everything, different pastors, different types of worship, different kinds of people, different kinds of races, different kinds of ministries, different kinds of music, different kinds of cultures.
All to aid to the progressing of God's kingdom and bringing God glory. One day God burdened me with this charge, "Son, help me get my children back." Oh, that's the call of us all! But each and everyone one of us should have this next thing happen to us as we pursue God and begin to ask how can we be of a help. "And this is how I want YOU to do it."
Find that. Your life will change. You'll come alive.
I have.
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