This is a repost of a blog from February 27, 2008. Considering that today is four year anniversary of the talk that started my dating of Jaime my wife...I though it'd be a great to recount the story that led to the talk...after all it is an another amazing God story. So here goes...

I've been meaning to actually update my blog now for a good month, but have just been busy a lot lately. So much has happened since my last post right before Christmas.

Literally at the end of the month of December, I think it was the 30th to be exact, I moved out of the parent's house and into that of a friend of mine's house. Ross had been asking for a year, but circumstances up till that point had prevented it. I felt that the time was right to make the move. As I told my mom on the drive over to show her where I was going to live, "I can't explain it, I just have the feeling that God wants me to do this, that it's the next step in his plan." Funny how quickly I'd see that plan start to progress and subsequent stages come into fruition.

On the way home from work on the 4th of January, I got a flat tire. So nice. My first. So I pulled aside into the gas station and changed it. I was planning on going home to my parents the next day to get some more stuff to move into the new place. Yeah that never happened. Ended up hanging around the area and getting the tired fixed. It just so happened that we got a bonus around that same time that covered the cost of the tires and some moving in costs. Since I couldn't get a bead on prices for tires from my brother-in-law (who works at a tire company) I decided to get it fixed at Sears and hang out with Ross and Dawn. Ended up going for lunch at a Chinese place. So we're making small talk, and Ross works into the conversation, that we were doing some work in the Engagement Room. The room is named thus because everyone who moves into that room ends up engaged within 6 months. I was moving in intended to break up that curse. Well Dawn opens up with, that's right, any prospects, and then proceeds to list every single woman at the Bridge.

Finally the fortune cookies come out. Ross opens his and its something lame. So I open mine and it says – "It's up to you to make the next move." Wow interesting fortune, well Ross goes – "Well now you can ask Jaime out!" That's been his statement for the past year, but I'd been kinda not been paying any mind to it at all. Dawn hears that and starts the whole discussion about Jaime. Asking if I liked her, if I'd prayed about her etc…I kept answering No, she's my friend. One of my closest friends, and I'd never given much thought to actually dating her. Besides, from knowing her, I had the impression she wasn't interested in dating. Finally I agree to pray about it, and Dawn says she'll check in on me in a few weeks. Then Dawn opens her cookie – "It's up to you to clarify."

Well I'm at the church the next morning for SYU and one of the youth kids Brandon goes to me – you and Jaime are the only single youth leaders left, you two should date. I'll get you the hookup. After the lesson he walks over to her and say something about her being single and needing to start dating, then his brother Puffy walks by and he goes, not him and walks away. Then comes the Bridge that evening. Of course I end up sitting with Dawn. Funny cause Dawn and I only had passing knowledge of each other and were merely acquaintances. So I give the whole not filling in the blanks prayer request about what Dawn and I had talked about the previous evening. Fast forward to worship – I'm sitting there and I get the audible voice – "I'll give you an answer but you'll have to do it." Then nothing else. So I start my week initially praying for a no. Wasn't getting anywhere, but it was starting to trend more toward the yes. So Tuesday at lunch I start fasting…

Thursday at noon. God starts talking again. First thing is "man should not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of God." From there I start hearing stuff like "just keep going. It will be worth it. Trust me. You're focusing too much on the end not the reason." Also got a bunch of stuff on beating back the flesh stuff from. Romans 7:14-25. 1 Cor 9:26-27. Romans 12:1-3 and Psalm 37:4,7. At that point the hunger I had just completely subsided.

Friday on the way to work. I'm listening to a sermon. I finish one sermon and pop the disc into for the other, and it was as if God was riding shotgun. The conversation was just that real. We sat there for what was left of my 40 min ride into work that morning, and he just convinced me that Jaime was it, that I should date her etc. He went through everything that constituted that short list of what I wanted in a wife, and just pointed out how she met that requirement. It wasn't a long list, it contained stuff about having a servants heart etc, having an amazing walk with God, etc…

Then as if that wasn't clear enough I go to work. 1 out of every 3 calls that day was from someone named Jaime. So I just kinda sit on this for about a week. Figuring I'll wait till after the youth retreat to bring it up. What was funny is I'd later find out, that the day before I got that flat tire, Dawn and Jaime had talked about it, and Dawn had actually prayed that if it was God's will, then he'd open a door for her to talk to me about it. And he did. After I got my answer, I went home and made myself a nice dinner. God had given me the answer, now I just needed to carry it out.

Spent a lot of time with her at the retreat. Probably more than I should have, but we'll leave that for another time. So I decide to finally have the talk with her on Wed Jan 23rd. About 5 weeks ago today. Of course I'm nervous and wondering how to go about doing so. The door gets opened earlier in the day by a random comment and a series of text messages where I found she knew to a point what was going on. However as she prayed (from what she would later tell me) she'd get pretty much – "be still and know I'm God." As if God was telling to her to relax, he was taking care of it.

It was funny because I actually opened her Bible 4 different distinct times during the weekend of the retreat – each time no matter if I was opening to the Old Testament or New Testament. I kept opening up to 1 Cor chapter 7. The chapter where Paul is discussing marriage etc. As if God didn't need to confirm it any more, he did just incase I missed everything else.

The discussion was almost too easy. It had to be all God. We ended up sitting there talking about stuff for hours watching GSN the whole time. So I ended up seeing the prayers of Pastor Travis answered. He had been praying for a good Godly woman for me. And lo and behold, God took his time and went and got me an amazing one.

I wanted to write this blog post before Christmas, but it's still the Christmas season, so I will share a little of some of my not so quiet time with God.

There has been a few occasions in the past two years, where a song on the radio has completely crushed me, and made me bawl like a baby, and they both tie into my theme. The first occasion was Father's Day weekend 2010. We had just found out we were having girls and I as a crazy Father, went to Walmart and bought a big box of diapers for them. I was on cloud nine, so excited to be a Father, and so excited to meet these little girls. All of a sudden the song More, by Matthew West came on the radio.

Just a face in the city Just a tear on a crowded street But you are one in a million And you belong to me And I want you to know I'm not letting go Even when you come undone

I love you more than the sun And the stars that I taught how to shine You are mine and you shine for me too I love you Yesterday And today And tomorrow I'll say it again and again I love you more I love you more

God spoke in his super quiet voice... "Those girls you love so much, even though you haven't met them yet, well I love you so much more, so much more than you could even imagine." And I cried like a baby as I drove home.

The second time was just recently, right before Christmas. I was driving home from Walmart yet again, with a Christmas gift for Jaime in the car, and this time it was Chris Tomlin and How Great is Our God.

The same result happened. More crying...boy am I such a baby.

It was then that God started to put some pieces in to place.

1. Jesus would totally give gifts, and they wouldn't be lame gifts, they would be the best he could give. Case in point, he gave up heaven, came as a fragile little baby, and grew up without sin, and suffered and died, and rose from the dead, all for me. If I was the only person who ever lived, he still would have come.
2. God is so much bigger than anything I could ever imagine. And any and all attempts would completely blow my mind.

It was then that I began to think of the little baby in Jaime's belly, and how God was stitching everything together and crafting the child, and how he had been that very same baby 2000 some odd years ago.

Oh yes, you shaped me first inside, then out; you formed me in my mother's womb. I thank you, High God—you're breathtaking! Body and soul, I am marvelously made! I worship in adoration—what a creation! You know me inside and out, you know every bone in my body; You know exactly how I was made, bit by bit, how I was sculpted from nothing into something. Like an open book, you watched me grow from conception to birth; all the stages of my life were spread out before you, The days of my life all prepared before I'd even lived one day. (Psalm 119:13-16).

For a child has been born—for us! the gift of a son—for us! He'll take over the running of the world. His names will be: Amazing Counselor, Strong God, Eternal Father, Prince of Wholeness. His ruling authority will grow, and there'll be no limits to the wholeness he brings. (Isaiah 9:5-7).

God had completely crushed me with how enormous the birth of Jesus was. Without the birth, there would be no death, no resurrection, no salvation, and the world would be headed to hell...Jesus suffered the first act of humility by becoming an embryo in the womb of a created being. He went through each and every one of the stages from poppy seed to lentil, to tomato, to baby. Sure we love Christmas and we love the gifts, but I'm not sure until this month did I completely ever take the time to reflect on it.

It was July of 2009 when God started to speak to us about children. We had just barely crossed the threshold of 6 months of marriage, and God was already transitioning us to the next stage. We would learn in the subsequent years that God is not someone who will let you grow stagnant, unless you ignore Him.

I remember clearly on one of my drives to the Data Center in Homestead, where I was working at the time, God speaking quietly the name David. It was more of a concept than an actual name. Looking up David in the baby name dictionary, the definition was "Blessed".

A few days later God said very clearly, "Your children will be blessed and will be a blessing." Wow no pressure, thanks God. Throughout the pregnancy which took place throughout 2010 with the twins arriving on October 27, 2010, almost a year and a half after God spoke those words, we were told that God had special plans for them, etc. Watching people's reactions to them as we walk through the mall, we see the promise coming to life.

I've waited over a month to post this blog, but first some lead in to the point of this post. After all, everything in life is a God story, and I cannot cut him out of this story, especially not on "Happy Birthday Jesus day!" as we've been telling the girls all day.

Starting not long after the girls were born, we started getting the question, "are you going to have more?" It's funny it started before the girls were even born. However as we started to think about it we had told God, (which is funny to tell God anything), that we needed a few things to be able to have more children.

Items on that list were, a new higher paying job for me, so that Jaime could either quit completely or cut back her hours even more to be a stay at home mom, our dream, as much as possible. Also, we needed a bigger family car to haul the girls, and any additional children. Finally we needed a house, at least a bigger living place to house the family.

May was a huge month, as we traded in the Malibu for a minivan, and Bettis made me an offer for $28,000 more than I was making already. I remember God saying clearly, there I've taken care of your roadblocks, the house will come, now you have no excuses.

Well the clearance took until the end of October to come in, a few days shy of the girls first birthday party. One of Jaime's obstacles, that we wait till the girls are a year old.

Right around the same time, the Vue's transmission etc died and we were facing new car payments, and wondering if we were going to be able to have another baby, and buy a house the next year. Though one Sunday walking in to Walmart after stressing about this, God spoke again, "Relax, I have everything under control, nothing changes, trust me."

Two weeks into the new job, I met Jaime after work, as she made me close my eyes and handed me in her words, "the biggest surprise she could give me." I told her she was making me nervous, as I had no idea what she could possibly be giving me, but I opened my eyes, and in my hands sat a test, a pregnancy test, that was positive. We were pregnant already when God told me to relax.

We told our families on Thanksgiving Day, and waited until Christmas Day to tell the world. For those of you doing the math, that puts the due day in July. July 30th to be exact (well as exact as one can be at predicting those things). So this year we have to wait till July for Christmas, for God's next gift. He's given us so many that it's hard to fathom, but as long as He takes care of the details, everything will be ok.

Merry Christmas!

It's kind of odd this morning as I wake up extremely early to go to work, about what I was doing one year ago today. Well exactly 1 year ago, I was still sleeping..., well maybe, maybe I was helping with one of the every two hour feedings and diaper changes that greeted our new life as parents of twins.

One year ago today, I walked into Expedient as a new employee. With it came all the promise and luster of a new job after working four years for DiamondStar Ltd, and Leprechaun and Clientrak support. Going from a company that called itself "The DataCenter", I was going to work for a company that specialized in actually being a DataCenter.

I had thought at the time that it was going to be the job that we felt God was going to give me after graduation, only 6 months prior in this case. Little did I know that within 3 weeks, Bettis would call for the first time for a phone interview, which I had applied for at the same time as Expedient. I didn't take them up on the phone interview at that time. Which was something that came up multiple times in the actual interview process 6 months later.

One year later, I have two amazing 13 and a half month olds who do much to amaze every day from saying "Thank You", to retrieving the exact book or item you asked for. They are so intelligent, and I am such the proud father, in case you couldn't tell.

I couldn't imagine leaving The DataCenter, after four years. It had been the job I was given after I left the Post Office because they refused to allow me off on Saturday Evenings/Sunday mornings to worship at church. A year after that decision, I was getting my license and my car, and a year after that I was marrying my wife, and a year after that my twin daughters were born.

It's crazy to think about how much life changes and God moves in a year, but neglecting to do so, doesn't mean that he hasn't. It just means we were likely too busy with change and God movement to notice.

Monday Morning, November 7th, 2011...my first day as a professional developer. The first day of my dream job. A job, that I had been working toward since I taught myself how to program GWBASIC back in 6th grade.

God made me a promise about five years ago , he said simply, "Trust me, and I'll give you a wife, a car, a job, and a new home." The funny part was at the time, I was living in my parents basement, working in a job that we barely got work at, no drivers license, and never dated anyone in my life. To say that I felt like Abraham a little would be no understatement.

So I trusted, and slowly the pieces fell into place, I walked out of the USPS on Black Friday 2006, with no job, just cause I wanted God more than a paycheck, especially since the job kept me out of the house of God. It took 6 months till I got a new job, but God was faithful, giving me several freelance jobs and a part time job in the meantime.

It was during that time that God taught me how to serve, and grew me in to the man I am today

A year after walking out of the USPS, I got my license and my first car. 2 months after that I moved out of my parents house and in with a friend, a month after that, I started dating the girl who would become my wife 9 months after that. Promise after promise that God made, God kept.

"Think about this. Wrap your minds around it. This is serious business, rebels. Take it to heart. Remember your history, your long and rich history. I am God, the only God you've had or ever will have— incomparable, irreplaceable— From the very beginning telling you what the ending will be, All along letting you in on what is going to happen, Assuring you, 'I'm in this for the long haul, I'll do exactly what I set out to do,' Calling that eagle, Cyrus, out of the east, from a far country the man I chose to help me. I've said it, and I'll most certainly do it. I've planned it, so it's as good as done." (Isaiah 46:8-11 Msg)

Two years after the wedding, we had beautiful twin daughters, a month after their birth, I started work at Expedient. Graduated with my bachelors degree in May, and accepted the offer for my dream job the day before I left for graduation.

It took a 6 month security clearance, but God took care of the details, and proved, "For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." (Jeremiah 29:11 NIV).

I don't have a problem trusting, it may be hard, and it may not look possible, but He's never let me down yet...and I don't expect it anytime soon because, "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever" (Hebrews 13:8 NIV)

There is a song whose chorus rings out " *breaking up is hard to do... * ". That's exactly how it felt leaving Expedient. It was a relationship, neither side really wanted to end, but somehow it did, and had to end. Much of my last week was rather boring, I met the deadlines and got the projects in on time, and we smashed the previous record.

Heck, honestly as I sat there midway through Monday I had no idea how that was even going to happen. I was stuck on a problem and had no idea how to solve it, but told my boss, that they will be finished today, and they were. Somehow with enough searches on the Google, the results gave us the answer which led to the completion.

Friday, was strange, I saw my boss at some point, and he said that I was pretty much free to leave whenever I wanted, but that he wanted me to stop in and say goodbye before I left.

I hung around and finished a couple last minute things, including documenting the solution to the problem the previous Monday, and made sure that the new guy had everything he needed to take over my projects on Monday. Many of which he had already done.

Went out to lunch one final time with the boys, then after lunch decided it was time to leave, so I cleaned up the last of my computer, and walked into the boss's office one final time.

After talking with him, it was on to the VP, or my boss' boss. I definitely felt like I was appreciated, as they rattled off how much they enjoyed having me, and that leaving was the right decision, and to keep in touch.

A year ago, I felt as though I was pushed out of the "DATA CENTER", as it was the middle of the week, and after half the workforce left, I was called in and dismissed...and uninvited to the Christmas party but told to keep in touch.

I found out how much that meant when I wanted to go visit the guys at the annual wing eat off and was told via a friend that the boss refused to come if I came. This time I think they mean it. These are pretty stand up guys. I am grateful for the future God has in store that he's opened up the door for.

So I did it. Monday was the day I put on my big boy shoes and quit my job. Well it wasn't quite that easy. I started my day at 9am, and found my boss to be in meetings till 11:30am, and for that matter most of the day. While getting jabs from the two co-workers who knew what I was going to do that day, I ended up waiting till about 4:30pm till I could actually give my notice.

I walked into my bosses office, asked if he had a minute and proceeded to close the door. It was like I straight up punched him in the stomach. He immediately put his head down and you could tell he was upset, though not angry. We proceeded to talk for a good ten minutes or so, where he explained he was upset, but not at me, he understood that I had to do what I could for my family.

The next day I had to write up and present a resignation letter:

The purpose of this letter is to tenure my resignation at Expedient Communications. My final day as an employee of the company will be Friday November 4, 2011. My time here has come to a close far too soon, but the competing and accepted offer was too good to pass up. I have enjoyed working for Expedient, as management has been a blessing to work for and with, and have been some of the best I have had the privilege of working with in my professional life. I thank Expedient for the opportunity to work for such an organization, and I have learned far more than I ever imagined that will be carried on throughout the remainder of both my professional and personal life. I will miss my coworkers and everyone in the company that I had contact with on an almost daily basis and will look back fondly on my short time at Expedient.

Tuesday was a nice day with relatively little news, except a lunch invite for sometime before I left with one of the VPs, or my boss' boss. So that will have to be figured out sometime next week. Wednesday and Thursday, I took off for the kids to get tubes in their ears and their 1st birthday.

Friday, I was greeted by my boss, who told me that I was the key till Monday. He later explained that we were on track to smash a record that we had broken three times this year, and I was the key to doing it, since I had two giant projects that would enable us to reach that goal, with both projects easy enough to accomplish.

Right before we left for lunch, they sent an email to my team, and a few of the adjoining teams:

Team, many of you, but not all, are aware that Matt Horvat has tendered his resignation. His last day with Expedient will be Friday, 11/4/2011. We are very saddened to lose Matt and wish him the best in his future endeavors. If anyone has any open projects, deliverables, or action items with Matt that you are concerned with, please touch base with me directly. Most of his open/current stuff will be transitioning directly to [Name Redacted]

We also got an invite to a farewell team lunch for me on Wednesday, which a co-worker told me does not happen very often.

I get to make good on an offer I made to my boss of sitting down and explaining anything to anyone, as I get to catch the new guy up on all my projects and answer any questions up until I ride off into the sunset next Friday.

One of those two projects by the way is almost complete, and the other one has a few minor issues to work through and it will follow suit soon thereafter.

It's strange to think that I'm leaving this job after such a short time, but I leave feeling valued and that my time there wasn't a waste. It's funny there were times where I wondered if they hadn't made a mistake in hiring me.

Now I just wonder if I'm up to the task of the new job. I talked to my new boss on Thursday, and I find myself being shipped off to training for Oracle Apex the first week of my new job. And it's an advanced class to boot...so I better at least get my feet wet so I'm not completely lost.

Sorry, folks, this blog post has nothing to do with Mr. Rushdie's novel of the same name. No this has to deal with the spiritual battle going on the last 3 days. Wednesday night, after work, I got the call that my clearance had been granted and I got my start date. November 7th. Within less than 24 hours the war was on.

I went to work like always, on Thursday, intending to wait until Monday to give my two week notice, especially since I had a mountain of projects and my boss was off on Friday. Well Thursday finds me assigned this mammoth project.

During the call for this project, Satan went to work...with pride.

Pride: Noun - a high or inordinate opinion of one's own dignity, importance, merit, or superiority, whether as cherished in the mind or as displayed in bearing, conduct, etc.

My boss assured the customer, he was in good hands, and named me Senior CommVault Administrator, and after the call, goes on to point out that I get the largest grossing projects, because I get it done, fast and perfect every time Gee as if I didn't need more of an reason to dread quitting.

After that I got asked point blank if I was still happy there and having fun. Which I answered yes...since it was true, the new job only means more happiness and more fun.

We keep getting told that giving a resignation would be like screwing our coworkers over.

And so I've been tortured with the notion of screwing over my coworkers, and that I'm too important to quit, and they won't let me quit etc...a whole lot of stress...

I'm mortified by Monday when I give my two week notice. I'm actually more mortified by the reaction than the action. I'm probably going to have to endure a whole lot of complaining, and questions and maybe even some yelling...and then two weeks of probably even more "Satanic Verses"...or lies from Satan...

YAY!!!!!

I can just imagine Moses leaving the desert of Midian headed back to Egypt. He was probably thinking "This is great, it's about time." Except he wasn't. God had grown him from the impatient man who killed an Egyptian to be the humble patient man who would spend so much time with God over the next forty years as he led the Israelites out of Egypt and toward the promised land.

Mike Pilavachi, in his book Soul Survivor makes this comment:

"Not very much grows on the mountaintops. Instead, things grow in the valleys. It is in the valley that we find life. To often we miss God's blessing because we stay on the mountain when the will of the Father is that we descend into the valley. We attempt to cling to the spiritual experiences, and as a result, the blessing becomes an idol. (p 64-65).

That observation could not be more true, or profound. We've spent much of the past five months feeling in the valley, as we waited for the clearance, after the offer was accepted. There were times that the clearance became an idol. There were definitely times that it felt like I wanted it more than I wanted God. It dominated my thoughts and affected my moods etc.

However that time down in the valley has made all the difference. I have watched God provide time after time, both with making ends meet, as well as watching my kids grow and develop and watch our family grow closer. I'm not sure that had the offer been accepted with a start date soon after would our family be where we are today.

While working at my current job, I have even seen my confidence in the workplace grow. I have handled multiple big projects and have even been implementation lead on others. I no longer fear the project I know nothing about, but embrace the research.

Well today at 4:59pm as I was running some Windows Updates on a server in Cleveland, I saw my phone light up, with a number that looked vaguely familiar. Here was the transcript of the voicemail that was left:

Hi, This message is for Matt Horvat, this is [Name Redacted] calling from the Bettis Laboratory calling to let you know that your clearance has been granted and I'd like to establish a start date with you if if you could please give me a call at [Number Redacted as well]. I would appreciate it. Thank you. Bye bye.

So I finish up my work day, and call the number back, darn voicemail...so I leave a message and start my drive home. A couple minutes later I felt a tug that I should call back, so I called back and my HR rep answered on the first ring, and I picked a start date November 7th.

Two hundred and twenty four days from the date of the interview, the time to leave the valley will come, and I will finally accomplish my dream of being a professional developer.

It's been a crazy journey, but one that was necessary and worthwhile...now time to just enter the exit lane for the last exit from Midian....

First up definition time:

Stagnation: a failure to develop, progress, or advance

Frustration: a feeling of dissatisfaction, often accompanied by anxiety or depression, resulting from unfulfilled needs or unresolved problems

Those words about summarize everything right now. For those of you who know me well, I hate to not be the best at whatever I embark on. I wanted to learn to cook, so I learned to cook well. I'm not a chef, but I feed myself and my family quite well. I wanted to learn how to program in C#, so I got 4 certifications in it.

I hate when I get to position where I'm stuck, where I can't progress, or in other words when I stagnate. My previous job, I left cause I had reached the highest level I was ever going to reach, the level I was when I started. My current job, I'm not sure there's much more for me there. I'm not doing what I want to be doing long term, and any raise is going to be laughable next year with the rising costs of children, and family.

I have two kids, and would love to have more, I have an apartment and would love to buy a house next year. I'm stuck. I haven't taken a certification test, or even really prepared for one in months, I haven't gotten any better at Magic, maybe slightly, but nothing to really brag about. I'm stuck and it's frustrating.

I'm waiting for change, God promised change, but it seems like it's taking forever to get here, and it's exhausting. I sleep plenty, but the wait and let down of it not being here yet, when I'm constantly being asked about sucks.

I get asked about Bettis all the time, I hope to win that elusive 4th win out of 5 rounds, we get asked about "the brothers" all the time. The answer is I'd love to, but we can't yet.

I wish today was the day, but it's not, and so I'm suffering from a case of Stagnation Frustration.

I entered Friday Night Magic this week with a Green/White/Blue Human Tribal deck, that should have been good, but if felt so bad after round three, that I probably wouldn't have thought twice about dropping if Jaime had needed me home.

I started the night having lost my last 8 rounds of Magic in a row...which started with round 4 of the Release Party after last weeks FNM, and through 4 rounds of a second release party on Saturday, and 3 rounds of Draft on Tuesday. The deck was just very inconsistent.

I had a chance to win round 1, and stalled horribly...round 2 was so bad, that I had a hard time congratulating the other guy for a good game. Round 3 was such a horrible mismatch against pod, and a deck that just stalled yet again.

There's a reason I don't play aggro...I'm horrible at it! I'm horrible playing with it and against it...

Then came the kid in round 4...the little kid born in 2000...and I almost snatched defeat from the jaws of victory...I let it go to game 3, and had to get the bonuses and flying angel token to manage to win that game...but it stopped my 11 round losing streak. And that made me happy...

Round five, found my deck working with a win over Freshwater and his blue deck, though even that went to three games.

So I ended the night at 2-3 at FNM, which is the block I'm kinda in - 2 and 3 to 3 and 2...that 4th win is so elusive.

Draft followed with a first round rematch against Freshwater who I managed to win games 2 and 3 against, followed with a game 2 and 3 win against Aaron, to put me at 2 and 0 and playing for first place in the pod...well that hurt to lose games 1 and 3 and finish third, due to a another player going 2-0-1 and just edging me out...

I started 0-3 but went ran 4 straight wins and with a loss at the end I finished at 4-4...

I really need to work a little harder to get over that .500 hump.

The story of Moses is a familiar one to a lot of people. Especially consider at least once a year some network runs "The Ten Commandments" during Easter season. Right now I'm actually starting to understand Moses a lot more than ever before.

As many of you know it's been 148 days since I accepted an offer from Bettis to do exactly what I've wanted to do since 7th grade when I taught myself Basic, become a professional programmer. I was told the process could take 4 to 6 months...well it's been almost 5 months, and still no clearance, which is required to being the job, it's the last thing on my requirements list before they actually start to pay me for something that's been a hobby for me since before I grew my first chest hair.

Back to the story of Moses, the man was born to redeem his people from the promised land. He then gets taken into Pharaoh's court and eventually flees to Midian where he lives the life of a shepherd for forty years. At this point Moses was starting to wonder if God's promise was ever going to come true. Some days I feel just like Moses.

We're living almost paycheck to paycheck, juggling when bills get paid based on due date and what our bank account looks like on that date. All with a promise from God that it'll come soon and we'll be taken care of. This job will pay me enough money to cover both my salary and Jaime's currently. In other words, it allows us to do a few things, such as allow Jaime to be the stay at home mom should she choose to, and allow us to discuss having more kids. We cannot have more kids, because doing so would require Jaime to quit her job to take care of them full time. And we rather enjoy living indoors.

Recently, we've (Jaime and I) have been reading "Soul Survivor: Finding Passion and Purpose in the Dry Places: Stranded in the Desert - Alone with God" by Mike Pilavachi. This is a book I've read a few times, and this one passage hit us last night:

The Lord is saying here (Deuteronomy 8:10-14), "Learn to be grateful in the desert. Learn to thank Me for the manna when you wish it were steak. Learn to praise Me for the good land I have given you even though you have not entered it yet, and then when you do prosper you will not forget Me. If you learn the secret of praise and worship when life hurts, then when life is good you will not forget me. (p 33)

God is always closer when he's all you have. God gets all the attention when you wonder how you're going to pay all the bills that month. Or who's going to watch your kids, or can you afford gas for the car, or for the little hobbies you have to break up the monotony of work and sleep. God has been absolutely huge for us this past year since the girls were born. Every need has been met, we have enough money each month, we have more people willing to watch our kids than we have times they need watched. We make an effort to have an evening alone for each of us each week out of the house away from the kids. I have a job I actually enjoy, even though, I have a better one waiting for me.

Therefore I sit in the desert chillaxin with God waiting for the day when the bush lights up (or rather Bettis calls me and says my clearance has completed) and life moves on to the next step.

Now for Moses the next step wasn't directly to the promised land, it was another forty years in the desert, though this time it was doing exactly what God has created him for. I'm not expecting this to be the promised land, starting at Bettis, though I realize that I'll be doing my dream job. I need to make sure that just like Moses, I refuse to move without God leading. After all what good is moving if God is not moving with you?

I was so happy to see this past Friday (9/24/11). It marked the end of quite the week for me. Saturday morning, I woke up and had a coffee with Jaime, and played with the kids and got excited for Tyler and Owen, the oldest two nephews to arrive. They were going to hang out and spend the night, go to church with us and join their parents and watch the Steelers game the next day.

Well shortly after the boys arrived, my face started to hurt on the left side. Now for a few weeks if I touched the cheek bone, I could feel a pain down into my mouth. I just assumed it a sign that my wisdom tooth was trying to come in and I needed to think about getting the tooth blocking it extracted, since the tooth had already been ravenged and was merely a shell of it's former self.

By Saturday evening I was taking four 200 mg Ibuprofens at a time, and I could feel my face starting to swell. Sunday morning brought even more intense pain, and at one point I think that I had 6 Ibuprofens in me. I could tell you as they wore off since that brought even more pain.

By Sunday afternoon Jaime had called the dentist on call number, and had talked to the dentist who was covering for the dentist and he prescribed me an antibiotic and 800 mg Ibuprofen. This made the rest of the day tolerable.

Monday I called off work, since it was creeping toward my eye and was generally starting to scare me. We got an appt with an oral surgeon for 1:30 that afternoon.

It was there that I was told I had an infected tooth, that would need to come out, so following the three most painful shots of Novocaine ever, the tooth was removed, and I was placed on Penicillin to treat the infection.

The swelling went down, and a week later it's almost not noticeable except for the missing tooth and the slight sensitivity as the face goes back to normal.

Then my week got even better...I got a cold in my chest, and spent the rest of the week coughing and sounding like a smoker...

Though my week got better when I stopped at Starbucks with my Subway dinner before Friday Night Magic. I got my first coffee in a week a Pumpkin Spice Latte with Soy and a slight bit of whip. It was ridiculous...like drinking a pumpkin pie...even had the whip cream topping...

It's been a strange week for me this week, which prompted this entry into the ever growing blog of mine. I've been waiting over a month and a half for the elusive call from Bettis about my clearance. I'd almost rather be told no than wait another day. The past two weeks, I've gone 1-3 and 1-4 at Friday Night Magic...in other words out of 9 total rounds I've won 2.

Wednesday night I got to play Magic and test some deck ideas with Anthony, and totally had a hard time putting anything together, everything I tried just fell flat.

I was feeling plain and simple like a phony. Like everything that I thought I was capable of doing I could not do. Then I recalled a blog post by Scott Hanselman: I'm a phony. Are you?

It was then that I started to realize what was wrong with me. And after talking to Jaime it all became clear:

The Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which unskilled people make poor decisions and reach erroneous conclusions, but their incompetence denies them the metacognitive ability to recognize their mistakes.

It took a long time to come to that realization. I realized that I had somehow sandwiched my self in between, being competent and being really good. I had just crossed the threshold of sucking, and gotten to the point of this entry. I am good enough to know... how much I suck, or how much I don't know.

I am good enough at Magic to win games and rounds, and put up tough games. But I am still not good enough to not make mistakes. I won my first three rounds at FNM tonight (before losing the last two). I made mistakes, in a couple games it didn't hurt me, in round 4 it crippled me.

In programming, people think I'm good...maybe it's the four certifications hanging on the wall (not literally), but I look and realize that there are tons of things I don't know how to do, that I need to work on. Especially since I'm waiting to start a development job.

I work with computers all day, and design some nice systems, quickly...but I also realized how much it is that I don't know.

So how did we fix my little crisis of confidence. Well I'm starting studying for certification number 5. I will start a playtesting/deckbuilding team with a good Magic player designed to make me better. At least to design better decks, and hopefully rub off some skill. I'll also realize that I don't have to be good at everything...

I didn't want to do one of these blog posts, since everyone is doing it, and has done it on Facebook. No one really cares where you were on Sept 11, 2001. It's just the common thread of remembering when it happened. For the record, I was sitting in my parents apartment in my room, unemployed at the time. I woke up and wandered over to the computer and signed onto AIM, when a friend of mine from Steel Center Tech Academy, told me to turn on CNN. I did and watched plane number two slam right into the second tower. And so America was forced to admit what the world had known for years, Islamic Terrorists were out to get our country, and finally scored a big hit. They had tried in 1993 to blow up the same buildings...and failed.

This morning I sat watching the coverage, ten years later and watched my little girl Faith, stand at the fence around the entertainment center and just watch as they unfurled the flag from the towers and sang the Star Spangled Banner. Ten years ago, I couldn't have even imagined the unfathomable blessings God has brought into my life.

Ten years ago, God wasn't the focus point of my life that he has become today. A few months after 9/11 I got a job working for the Post Office. Five years later, God was something that was worth giving everything for, and I responded to his promise of "a wife, a car, a house, and a new job, if I followed him". I was a single guy who had never had a girlfriend, didn't have a license, and couldn't imagine finding another job. I stepped out in faith, and God provided. And this morning I got to play with my little girl Faith, who is the best cuddler in the world. I also got to roll around with Phoebe as well.

My life was complete this morning, ten years later, not because of how I responded to a terrorist attack, but because of how I responded to God.

Spend any significant amount of time with me and you'll figure out a couple things about me fairly easily: I am a husband and a father. Since I spend so much of my time focused and engulfed in that area of my life, it's everything I want to talk about. There are people who have never met Phoebe and Faith but who ask about them since I talk about them enough that the practically know them.

As I've been getting ready for the small group that starts in several days, as I said in my previous blog post, God's been speaking Acts 4:13 over and over again.

They couldn't take their eyes off them—Peter and John standing there so confident, so sure of themselves! Their fascination deepened when they realized these two were laymen with no training in Scripture or formal education. They recognized them as companions of Jesus ( Acts 4:13 Msg).

For those of you who don't know the story, Peter and John were just walking past the temple when a crippled person asked for money. Peter looked at him and said basically, "I don't have any money but what I can give you is healing, in Jesus' name get up and walk." This healing started a giant teaching session. Peter and John just stood there and spoke about Jesus, their friend and Lord, and about everything that they had seen and heard. Eventually they were called into the chief priest and stood toe to toe with them and proclaimed Jesus accurately and in such a way that the religious leaders just stood in awe of them. There were two men who a few years earlier were fishermen, and had no education of any means. However the time they spent with Jesus made them able to talk about him. They had spent so much time with Jesus both before and after the Ascension that they had no problem talking about him.

What I take away from the story, and from God's word to me, was that I don't need to fear being able to lead a discussion about God, as long as I've spent enough time with God and his word to know him, to know his character, and what his word means.

The question is will people be able to determine that I spent any time with God, or will I just look like a guy who read a few books? I could read about being a husband and a father, but that is nothing like being the real thing. I'm going to need God's help to be able to speak from experience with Him rather than from reading a book about him.

I guess since "everyone is doing it" maybe I should jump in and join the blogosphere yet again. However, I decided to write my own blog engine, and through the process of actually blogging, I'll develop and improve the code until it's actually usable.

Life right now has become a tenuous waiting game, waiting for the phone to ring with news of my clearance being issued with accompanying start date. Till then, I go everyday to work at a job that I could be giving my two weeks notice to at any date. However right now, I find that I'm more or less, working my butt off, since I'm working for God not the company (even though they're nice enough to pay me). So I find that I'm flying through work, working extremely hard, only to get more work piled on top as soon as I finish. For example, today I called off since I woke up to a fit of vertigo and nausea, by quitting time after working for an hour on project plan, I had 4 more assignments for to add to the giant project I'm already working on. That's what I get for doing everything for the glory of God despite the circumstances. Many would slow down to the point of barely working while waiting to give their two weeks, but my love for God has me working harder than I have in the 10 months I've worked there.

Also, I'm less than a week away from starting a Life Group (or Bible Study/Small Group) with my wife Jaime. We've been asked to lead on so we jumped on the idea, since we've been largely dormant in serving since the birth of our daughters. I'm getting a little nervous about teaching each week at a Bible Study, since I'm not exactly one who does that kinda stuff...then again before last June I could say I'm not exactly the kinda guy that preaches sermons either, but God stretched me there too. The more I think about it the more God comes back with this verse:

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"They couldn't take their eyes off them—Peter and John standing there so confident, so sure of themselves! Their fascination deepened when they realized these two were laymen with no training in Scripture or formal education. They recognized them as companions of Jesus" (Acts 4:13 Msg).

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The part that God's been hammering in is, no formal education is needed, time with Jesus is. Therefore I'm gonna just spend some time chilling with Jesus this week, and allow that time hanging out with the guy who wrote those same scriptures allow me to understand them well enough to "teach them", to our group no matter how big or small that group ends up being.