This has been a long time coming. It’s been months since I poured out my heart via this webpage, but my heart is overjoyed and bursting with thankfullness for so many things.
Today is March 21st, 2011
Currently I’m sitting at the window of Empresso Coffee house located on Stockton’s Miracle Mile. People are talking, background music is playing, the slams and the sound of coffee grinding fills the room. One might say that this is like organized chaos.
It’s Monday morning and the people here are choosing to spend their morning here to prepare for the hustle and bustle work week. I’m sitting here watching cars go by and watching people walk in the door and am finding myself in awe and in amazement that there are so many different types of people in this city. People with different backgrounds, different perspectives, different lifestyles, different economic statuses, different nieghborhoods, different goals, different personalities, different interests, different hearts.
It really amazes me that God knows each and every one of these people intimantley and loves and adores them.
As I look at my own life, I realize how my life in alot of ways has been like this coffee shop. My life, like this place, has been organized chaos. Just here me out. There have been so many things which have taken place in my life which in some ways have shaped me into the person I’ve become. There have been times that my heart has been put to the grind by the gnarliness of life’s trials (kind of like the coffee beans being grinded) but in the end there’s something beautiful, something refined and something that’s able to be enjoyed. In another sense, I think about the countless numbers of people who have been involved in my life in some aspect or another. People with differing opinions than my own, differing goals than mine, differing perspectives than mine, and people with differing personalities than my own. Like this coffee shop, in my life, people have played an active roll. People come and sit and drink, some use the space, some help out around the shop, some support and promote, and others may find a sense of comfort here. In my life there have been people who are just simply there in my life. There are those which help build me up, support me through my darkest times and those who constantly point me to Jesus. They encourage me, they pour into me, and they treat me like a brother and friend. There also have been other people who I’ve been able to pour into and encourage and love. In my life there also has been “Background noise”…something which I like to see as the subtleties of life. The fun times, the boring times and the times which have left me satisfied and overjoyed.
This building cannot be called a coffee shop without the grinds, the chaos, the background noise and the people. If people didn’t come here and converse and enjoy it, these doors should just be closed.
I’m not saying I find my satisfaction in people or the business of life, I find that in Christ but what I am saying is that I’m thankful that those people are in my life.
I turn 23 years old today and can honestly say, my heart is resounding with joy, knowing that my life thus far has been filled with great people and great memories. So here’s to another 23. Love you all.
