READ REED.

I was blind but now I see is a very known statement from the Gospel of John, I have always read over it quickly never giving it much thought or relating it to my life. As many of you known I recently went on a trip to Haiti, This was my second time visiting the country. This trip was different thou, weeks leading up to the trip I wasn’t super excited about the trip. The packing and time taken off work were becoming more of a burden rather than a build up of something special. My perspective was off, I allowed little things that mean nothing to really get my focus off God and want he planned to do in my life.

The second evening we were in Haiti we went to the famous Obamaville which is a huge tent city. We did ministry and handed out candy. After our time in the town square an intern of the Mission of Hope pulled a Haitian woman into our vehicle, This led to a stop where our team got to pray for a crippled boy, a mother, and her child. This was very powerful time, and following it I walked back towards the truck and noticed a group of about 4 little boys. I approached them and did the classic pound the fist sign and as the first boy was about to punch my fist he faked me out and him and his friends proceeded to laugh at me. It was quite humorous.  During that interaction with those boys I had a moment in time that I can’t shake. These boys where in bad shape, they had bloated stomaches and I’m sure were lacking in just about every nutritional category. That however did not stop them to have a moment of joy and happiness in suffering. Those smiles will never leave me.

In my life I can sometimes get down about little things that in the big picture mean nothing. Luxuries that I take for granted should not drive me into a cycle of depression or anger.  This idea of joy in suffering is something that is very new to me and I’m starting to understand it. No, I can’t relate to being hungry or thirsty but I’m a soul needing love,mercy,forgiveness, and joy just like those boys. When I don’t have anything according to the world I have plenty according to God. Maybe all this stuff that I add to my life isn’t good and really it’s just a burden on my soul that already has enough through his Love.  The trip was filled with many great moments and I could spend days writing and reliving this trip. God changed my heart and I’m very thankful that I had the opportunity to go and go with a group of people who I love.

I was blind but now I see.

My vacation from blogging continues, I’m off to a land known for the quake and mango’s. It shall be a french delight.

lapè nan ou.

I go through phases with music and currently I’m in a Jason Wade (Lifehouse) phase. His writing is amazing and this is one tune I’m digging.

Broken is the title of the song and it’s a message of honesty, something  I think we all need in our lives to surrender ones will to a higher being.  The lyric that really kills me is “I’m falling apart, I’m barely breathing With a broken heart that’s still beating, In the pain there is healing, In your name I find meaning.” I know personally my growth as a human has been most known to me in times of brokenness, I firmly believe meaning is found in those times. God is a hard dude to understand, Why he loves me, or Why he entrust with me with so much? Is and will always be a mystery to me but I know these things to be truth.

I’m done. Here is the lyrics and the song if you were wondering what it actual sounds like. Cheers!

The broken clock is a comfort, it helps me sleep tonight
Maybe it can stop tomorrow from stealing all my time
I am here still waiting though i still have my doubts
I am damaged at best, like you’ve already figured out

I’m falling apart, I’m barely breathing
With a broken heart that’s still beating
In the pain, there is healing
In your name I find meaning
So I’m holdin’ on, I’m holdin’ on, I’m holdin’ on
I’m barely holdin’ on to you

The broken locks were a warning you got inside my head
I tried my best to be guarded, I’m an open book instead
I still see your reflection inside of my eyes
That are looking for a purpose, they’re still looking for life

I’m falling apart, I’m barely breathing
with a broken heart that’s still beating
In the pain (in the pain), is there healing
In your name (in your name) I find meaning
So I’m holdin’ on (I’m still holdin’), I’m holdin’ on (I’m still holdin’), I’m holdin’ on (I’m still holdin’)
I’m barely holdin’ on to you

I’m hangin’ on another day
Just to see what you throw my way
And I’m hanging on to the words you say
You said that I will be OK

The broken lights on the freeway left me here alone
I may have lost my way now, haven’t forgotten my way home

I’m falling apart, I’m barely breathing
with a broken heart that’s still beating
In the pain(In the pain) there is healing
In your name I find meaning
So I’m holdin’ on (I’m still holdin’), I’m holdin’ on (I’m still holdin’), I’m holdin’ on (I’m still holdin’),
I’m barely holdin’ on to you

I’m holdin’ on (I’m still holdin’), I’m holdin’ on (I’m still holdin’), I’m holdin’ on (I’m still holdin’),
I’m barely holdin’ on to you

this two month break from blogging has been nice. however, i have lied. i have renewed my domain name. readreed is just straight baller and i could not give it up. i have failed you. i’m sorry. peace.

I have decided to change my blog up. Within the next month my domain name ownership will expire and I will change it to dustysandroid and will switch templates also. Please don’t cry I’m not quiting I’m just switching things up like a monk. Peace.

slacker radio makes pandora squeal like a pup.

chillin like a killin watchin the tigs and drinking voltage. life is complete. peace. reed out.

Often the church as a whole spends time eyeing faults and issues of fellow believers before they examine their own. In my opinion, Jesus’s biggest statement was found in Matthew 7 “And why worry about a speck in your friend’s eye when you have a log in your own?” The magnitude of this sentence transcends thought and faith it’s pure gospel. A message that doesn’t care where you have been or what you have done. A message that doesn’t judge the weary and broken by bad choices. A message that loves first and loves second. I know we all struggle with this concept, Because it’s so easy to compare our lives with others because it gives us a sense of completion or worth. We miss the fact that our identity is complete because we have a creator that loves us despite our mistakes and flaws. Jesus statement is something we all need in our lives. Manly because we are taught in our culture to always judge a book by its cover. We never see the beauty in suffering. I know in my own life I have fought many battles, I have won some and lost some. My flaws and shortcomings don’t give me a platform to judge and examine the people who go before me. They give me a reason to not judge, but rather love with no agenda. My prayer is I can live this out. Peace. Reed out.

Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

^17-20But I need something more! For if I know the law but still can’t keep it, and if the power of sin within me keeps sabotaging my best intentions, I obviously need help! I realize that I don’t have what it takes. I can will it, but I can’t do it. I decide to do good, but I don’t really do it; I decide not to do bad, but then I do it anyway. My decisions, such as they are, don’t result in actions. Something has gone wrong deep within me and gets the better of me every time.

^21-23It happens so regularly that it’s predictable. The moment I decide to do good, sin is there to trip me up. I truly delight in God’s commands, but it’s pretty obvious that not all of me joins in that delight. Parts of me covertly rebel, and just when I least expect it, they take charge.

²⁴I’ve tried everything and nothing helps. I’m at the end of my rope. Is there no one who can do anything for me? Isn’t that the real question?

²⁵The answer, thank God, is that Jesus Christ can and does. He acted to set things right in this life of contradictions where I want to serve God with all my heart and mind, but am pulled by the influence of sin to do something totally different.

Romans 7:17-25 MSG