Changing Seasons

Seems like I am not the only one going though a change in my life. Tonight we heard from Julio Melara at church. In the last year I have gained a very high respect for Julio and when he speaks I focus on the words coming out, because they have definite meaning behind them.

His message tonight was on changing seasons in life. Was there anyone else in the room? I know that I was certainly meant to hear this one.

One point I especially liked and will be thinking on over then next few days is: Many times in our lives our foundations are shaken. When this happens we turn to God, only to find that it was God who was shaking them. Sometimes God must get our attention, and that is the only way he can.

5 Preparations of the heart, for a change in season

1) Have a heart of Gratitude (take NOTHING for granted)
2) Heart of Expectancy (Expect God's hand in your life)
3) A Humble heart (reach for heaven, but do so from your knees)
4) Focused heart ( every battle you face happens in the mind first, focus on what is right and good Phil 4:8)
5) A Relentless heart (don't give up)

Gal 6:9 - And let us not lose HEART and grow weary and faint in acting nobly and doing right, for in DUE TIME and at the appointed SEASON we shall REAP, if we do not loosen and relax our courage and faint.

We all go through LOW (Lonely, Overwhelmed, Weak) points in our life. Use the Word to give you the strength you need to get you through these times.

Don't worry about the economy, your life,, money, children, or your job. God knows all of this and he isn't worried one bit. He created the heavens (yes all of the universe, that's a big place) and the earth. During all of this God never even broke a sweat. He did all of that so should a job or test or economy worry us when he is in control? NO!

Congrats Alex and Nancy

I have to say congrats to my long time friend Alex. He and Nancy finally tied the knot on Oct 25. I am so happy for them. They are a great couple and I wish the world for them.

I have known Alex since we were 6 years old. We were in Tiger Cubs together! Alex is a steadfast friend and deserves the wonderful woman he has found in Nancy.

Good luck in the future, and thanks for the wonderful memories!!!

Passing of a Friend

17 Years and 10 days, that's an old dog!

This was a sad weekend in the Brinson family, as we put our dog, Samantha Brinson, to sleep on Saturday Oct 10th. We are not worried about her though because as the movie says, all dogs go to heaven."

Sam has been a member of our family since the fateful day she showed up on our doorstep in 1992. She'd had 3 different owners (not including the breeders) in the first 6 months of her life! We were able to track down the original purchaser of her and she called the present "owner" of Sam. When he said that he hadn't even tried to look for her, during the days she had been missing, she asked us if we wanted to keep her. We of course said yes. I feel sorry for the other families who passed her up, because we have been more blessed than words can describe to have her as a part of our family.

Sam was an incredible dog, it will be hard to ever find another with such an awesome personality and the energy that she carried her whole life.

We will miss you Samantha!

Post Gustav

This last week has been a blur, with enough work and stress to last for 3 weeks. I personally was only away from the hotel for about 3 hours total from Sunday to Friday at noon.

Gustav while not a very powerful hurricane at landfall was still able to produce the windiest storm in the recorded history of Baton Rouge. You can see the effects of this throughout the older neighborhoods of the city, like the one I live in called 100 Oaks. Most of the city has been out of power since Monday morning. Many parts, including my neighborhood, are not expected to get power back for some time, as many as 21 days. At least the electricity bill will be low this month.

On Friday Kristin and I had had enough of the hotel and decided to get away for a day, and headed to Lafayette to her Mom's house. We picked up a generator from her Dad's house and settled in for an easy night.

Today I have done not much more than sit on the couch and watch College football and the history channel. Kristin filled the day shopping for a wedding dress. I found out that wedding dresses cost more than the typical man's wedding band. She wears the dress for maybe 8 hours but the man wears the ring for the rest of his life.

This was a much needed day of rest, for the both of us.

Now we just have to get ready for the Ike. The bright side of this is if I don't have power restored by then at least I won't have to worry about losing electricity again.

Riding out the Storm

"He stilled the storm to a whisper; the waves of the sea were hushed.Psalm 107:28-30"

Well it is finally here, after a week of constant preparation and anticipation, the storm is here!

The hotel is as ready as possible. The church is ready with text and email alerts to help whoever is in need. My apartment is as ready as possible, I just hope no major trees fall on it or the roof doesn't blow off. Kristin's house is as ready as possible.

Kristin and I, along with most of our management team are hunkered down in the hotel. We are considered "essential personnel." That's an exciting title. We have a full hotel with first responders. These people will be essential to restoring the area to normal as soon as possible.

The only weapon that we have is prayer. Prayer for low damage, strength, endurance, and focus. Focus for the task at hand, and on the one who makes all life possible.

We just have to do what the Casting Crowns song says and "praise him in this storm.". For, "When the storm has swept by, the wicked are gone, but the righteous stand firm forever.Proverbs 10:24-26."

Life Without Kristin

What started out as a dreaded 17 days without Kristin, has amazingly turned around completely. As I watched her leave New Orleans I looked at the next 2 weeks with a sense of impending boredom and loneliness. Now 14 of those days have past I now say "she's coming back already?"

Don't get me wrong, I have missed Kristin like no other, but I can't believe the trip is almost over already.

It makes me understand, slightly, how much she is in the same mindset, that she can't believe it's time to come home already.

Of course I also had a mini vacation with my family in St. Simon's Island, Ga. This defiantly distracted me from her absence a little.

I got to hang with my family for a few days. One of the highlights of the trip was getting to play Thomas' new course, Brunswick Country Club (www.brunswickcountryclub.com). This course was designed by legendary Donald Ross, the Bob Ross of golf course design. The course is elegantly treacherous; it is wide open but deceiving when it comes to distance to the pin.

I can't wait to see my fiance again but I have an idea after the last 2 weeks as to how fast it can go by. I don't know if I am making known very clearly what my feelings are right now. What I am trying to say is that I now understand how short 2 weeks can be. I feel for her because she has to leave a place she has come to love after what is in reality a very short time. I now understand, albeit very small amount, how she is going to miss Swaziland.

I thank God for the work she has done over there and the work Swasziland has done on her.

Kristin, I can't wait to see you again!

Sunday June 29, 2008

Sleep in. I almost forgot how to do this. But then again when you have stayed up to 3:30 shooting the breeze for the last two nights, you aren’t actually getting any extra sleep.

This weekend is the Porsche Club of Amreica’s annual Porsche Parade. The event took place in Charlotte this year. Sunday was the actual car show, and competition. There were people in the competition that were there at 6:30am wheels off their cars, actually cleaning their brakes with Q-tips. That’s some pretty serious stuff. So we walked down to the show, there were probably close to 500 Porsches lining the streets of Uptown Charlotte. It was a beautiful sight.
Most of these rides were immaculate. The only model of Porsche I did not see represented was the Porsche tractor. So they did a pretty good job of representing the entire gambit of Porsche history.

We then went down to the Lake rode the Jet skis and boats around, lounged around for the rest of the day.

After this weekend I don’t really want to go back to work. I just want to do things like this for the rest of my life. Although I guess I have to pay for it somehow.

Saturday June 28, 2008

So you have a Ferrari for a day what do you do? Well you must show it off, so you visit friends and let them gawk at it. Then you slap a Ferrari smile on their face by taking them for a quick, and I do mean quick, ride around the block.

This was a weekend that Bryan had planned for us to do for the last few weeks. The only thing was that I was not allowed to know what we were doing. All he did was tell me what kind of clothes to bring. After the obligatory showing off of the ride Bryan and I head up to the mecca of speed in Charlotte, Lowes Motor Speedway. We then spent 3 hours or so racing karts on the infield karting track. For those of you who don’t know karting is not your average go-kart. These things require racing suits and helmets and are capable of speeds in excess of 100mph and can travel from 0-100-0mph in 6 seconds.

During one of the brakes from karting Bryan says “stay right there I have to go get something.” He comes back giving me a piece of paper and says “I need you to fill this out.” I look down and it is my liability waiver for the Richard Petty Driving Experience. So we spend the next couple of hours and do the Rookie class for the RPDE. At the end you get 8 laps (far too few) in the car on the track. According to the instructors the fastest that they will allow the students to go is a 43 sec lap. Remember the cup cars are qualifying in the high 20s. Of course that is what I scored, with a top speed of 141.05mph. There was so much more speed in that car. I wish that they would have allowed me to actually push it. The only downside to this adventure was that just as Bryan got strapped into the car it started to pour rain. He didn’t get to run. He wasn’t too disappointed though because he did get to drive a Ferrari away from the track.

I love how that rolls off of the tongue, why don’t you try it right now, just say it out loud, F-e-r-r-a-r-i.

The day concluded by checking out Dale Jr’s new bar in Charlotte, Whiskey River. It was ok, but we ended up at the ole faithful new bar, Ri Ra.

In the wise words of Ricky Bobby, “I wanna go fast.”

Mark how was your day, Friday June 27?

I woke up early on Friday morning and started out with pancakes that my Dad had cooked. For those of you who don't know pancakes are a Brinson tradition. Every Saturday morning pancakes are had at my parents house, and my uncle's house, and until he died at my grandfather's house. Since my parents were leaving town on Friday afternoon I was given this treat a day early.

After this Dad and I went to the country club for a round of golf. This is always a great way to begin your day, especially when you get the first tee time. There was no one in front of us to slow us down. I won't talk about scores, I'll just tell you that the ole'man won. To me though it didn't matter too much because a day at the golf course is always better than a day at the office.

Later in the afternoon I met up with Tyson, at the Rock Hill airport and we took one of the planes up. No real reason for the flight other than to catch up with Tyson. Also the fact that I really haven't flown in the last 6 or 7 months.

After the flight I headed over to the Zeiss' house. I was sitting in the family room catching up when all the sudden I heard this glorious sound. It was as if heaven itself had just let 480 horses loose in the Zeiss' driveway. So of course I had to go out to investigate the source of this heavenly song. I opened up the door and there's Bryan (with a huge smile on his face) reeving the engine of an 05 Ferrari F430. Of course he says "so you want to go for a ride?" "Uhmm...Yes?" was the only answer I could come up with. As we were tearing down an empty street in a new neighborhood with no houses he stops the car. "Do you want to drive?" I think I was already out of the car by the time my answer was able to get out of my mouth. "Does a bear crap in the woods?"

So Mark, how was your day? Well...it didn't suck.

Comfort Zones

If you want to grow you have to step out of your comfort zone.

All of the biggest breakthroughs in my life have occurred when I have totally stepped out of my zone, dating Kristin long distance, starting back to church, moving to Baton Rouge, and most recently going on an outreach at our church's Dream Center campus.

We loaded up on Saturday morning into the back of a pickup truck and headed into the ghetto of BR. I was terrified to be doing this, but decided to stick with it. I have never willingly done this in my life. I was not comfortable enough to be one of the people passing out drinks and care packets so all I did was pick up trash. It was honestly one of the most rewarding things I have done in a while. I am still not entirely comfortable with the idea but I will be doing it again.

She Said Yes!

On Friday night April 25 at around 10:30pm I got on my knee and asked Kristin to marry me.

We were on our way home from our lifegroup meeting and I had Kristin stop at the Crosses. I knew she wouldn't really be expecting it, so I had to do it quickly. This is one of her favorite places so I knew it would be meaningful for her.

Please don't ask when its going to be and all that good stuff. We will be giving everybody more information as soon as we know it.

HPC Men’s Conference

2 days, 4 main speakers, 2 awesome panel guests, and 2 hosts, what an awesome weekend.

Dino Rizzo and Mike Haman just hosted the first HPC Men’s Conference. They lined up some truly great speakers, Coach Bill McCartney, Kevin Mawae, Joel A’bell, and Zhenya Kasevich. There were two breakout sessions, the one I attended was hosted by Dino and was a panel with Julio Malara and Le Domainge. These two men are both very successful businessmen who’s calling in life is to make money for God and to minister to the business world. One of the questions that was asked was “What do you tell people when you are at a conference and a young man asks you what is your secret?” Julio said without hesitation “I answer my personal relationship with Jesus Christ.” He said that the usual reply is something like, “that’s great but what’s your secret?” So he tells them again. I could sit and glean knowledge from these two men for days on end.

The speaker who touched me the most was Joel A’bell of Hillsong in Australia. He talked about the 5 weaknesses or traits rather that the Devil likes to attack men with. I have to say that I defiantly struggle with one or two of them. And about when we get idle we tend to lose focus on what is important. He really made me realize that the last 2 months I have been focusing too much energy on work and allowing it to define me. I have been so intent on it that I have stopped reading the books that better my life, and stopped really studying the Bible. I had based too much of my happiness on what was happening at work and not on what was good in my life.

I have resolved to change those areas and have felt so much better over the last week. I am taking the problems at work in stride, and focusing on my relationship with God and Kristin. In just one week I have felt a change, I am sleeping better and more restfully, I have much more energy and I see God working in my life again.

What a great weekend.

Bittersweet Weekend

Funeral weekend. Need I say more. But even in times of sadness you have to have a little fun.

It started out with a lovely 6 hour ride to Birmingham from Baton Rouge. We got in at about 10:45pm, and were all dog tired. After we went to our rooms my mind was still racing with the drive and events to come in the weekend. So I kidnapped my brothers for a nightcap. The funny thing is that when I went to get Eric I think that Lisa Marie was genuinely offended when I said that she wasn't really invited. Nothing personal there are just some things that you can only discuss with your brothers. I am very glad that I did this because we were able to have an excellent conversation about, well things that only brothers can discuss.

The next morning the funeral started early. It was open casket, I don't like open casket deals. The answer is no they don't look like they are sleeping. Kristin was able to come and did without ever asking, she was a trooper all the way through it (even with the open casket), even though she never even met my grandma before. That meant so much to my family and myself.

The memorial service was pretty awesome. Uncle Fran gave the family remembrances. There was no one better suited to do this. He very eloquently talked about the best parts of my Grandmother. No one else in the family would have been able to hold it together and speak with such power about her life. Thanks Fran.

The pastor was great also. My favorite thing that he said was that we don't move on to a better place like we just up and moved to Florida. We actually die, and it IS Final. The true power of our lives as Christians is that God promises to resurrect us just like he did for Christ. We will be brought back to life in a new world that God has created just for us. All tears will be wiped away by God himself, and there will be no more pain, death, or suffering (Rev. 21:4).

Grandma is up there with Granddad with nothing but joy in their hearts looking down and smiling at us right now.

Enough of the depressing stuff. You absolutely cannot stay sane if you go through a day with only thinking about the depressing idea of death. So we defiantly had some fun. Just a short recap. We broke into the bell tower at the church, and of course while we are up in the bells my dad started to ring the bells. Later we left the church and beat my dad to Betty's house and he is the native. We left and went to Grandma's old house and took a tour of it while the current owners weren't home. Just as we were walking out of the house the current owner's brother in law drives up. Luckily the next door neighbor, Mr. Neighbors, had our back. And then of course a long ride back home.

Thank you to everyone who has offered their prayers up for my family and I. We greatly appreciate it.

An End To Suffering

This morning the Matriarch of our family Wilberta Brinson died. She had suffered for over 10 years with Alzheimer's disease. Even though she has been dead in the mind for at least the last 6 years. It doesn't make her passing any easier on the family.

The good thing is that she had a relationship and is now sitting with Jesus, and I am sure has already had a great long hug from my grandfather who went ahead of her in 1991. All suffering and confusion that she had here over the last few years has now evaporated away, and she now has clarity that we can not even imagine.

What kind of woman was she?

If anyone asks what kind of person she was, all I have to do is tell them to look at my father and then tell me what kind of person she was. For the last 9 years she has been living in an assisted living home in Charlotte. My father took the reigns on taking care of her and staying with her while this disease ran its course. My parents were determined that grandma would not be one of those that was left in a home and forgotten. Everyday Dad would get off of work and have dinner with her (although in the past 3-4 years he has actually been feeding her). He would even go on Sat and Sunday. If for some unforeseen reason my Dad couldn't make it my Mom would go in his stead.

So what kind of woman was she?

If children are a reflection of their parents then, she must have been an incredible woman because my father is one incredible man to do what he did.

Though it is sad, I am thankful that the suffering is over for her and that she can finally see what heaven is like.

We'll miss you Di-Di mama.

God's Spin

Romans 8:28
"And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose."

I have been thinking today about blogging. I don't ever do it, and I've been told that either you do it or you don't. I see other people's blogs and think that everyone seems to have something to say every day, and I don't. So I though that I would just give it up and close my account today, but then I saw this story.

(http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,344350,00.html)

If you don't want to read it then here is a brief synopsis. A boy drew the picture seen above for his school assignment, and the teacher gave him a zero because it depicted a cross and religious verse. The teacher says that he was trying to promote religious views. The boy is suing because he says that there are figurines of buddha and indian gods around school and other kids were allowed to draw demonic images. So why is he not allowed to show his religious views.

I agree 100% with this kid. I think he has the right to draw whatever he wants, and that the school and all of these atheist fanatics out there don't have the right to try and take away a kid's first amendment right that they themselves so freely use. I believe that there is a minority in the US that is allowed to persecute/segregate against Christians, (who by the way founded the country and make up a majority of the population). I wish that something would be done about that, I would vote for that Guy, if he ran.

So my initial reaction was outrage at what was going on, but then God smacked me on the back of the head and said "No, look again." So I did, and I had to laugh. The anti-Christians out there have tried to block this kid and not show his religious values. But just like Romans 8:28 says God spun it around and this art and story has now been broadcast to a million times more people than would ever have seen it otherwise. This teacher and other "equal rights" activists were trying to stop the spread of God's message, but God will always find a way.