Wednesday, July 22, 2009

so if you didnt already know...




...you may as well hear it now. a lot about me in a little bit of space. no really, alot. when i was two my parents got divorced. my mother left my drunken drug addict dad (thats how she always put it) for my drunken drug addict step dad (thats how she never put it). i would say it hurts still. more now of course, knowing she could have stayed with my dad and been just as unhappy as she was all those years. but she didn't. my dad is an interesting fellow. he had four children with four women. my mother had me then my brother fifteen years later with my step dad. then theres my step sisters, 2 of em. both of them had diferent mothers and my stepdad as a father. that makes me probably the only person you know with 2 brothers and 4 sisters and grew up an only child. crazy huh? back to dad, k, he used to take me to parties with drugs and alcohol, i was maybe five the first one i recall. i think he the only person i ever saw staggering drunk witnessing to people about jesus with a joint in his hand. thats the kind of religion i got. in his defense grampa was a ufo chasing drunken seance kind of christian whod tell you jesus was coming back to get us in a ufo. so at least dad broke that pattern. aside from the craziness, dad was and still is probably the hardest working man i know. and he was always taking us camping and fishing and to strip clubs and biker rallies. that was kinda wierd. but usually exciting.

mom, work all her life to make ends meet. step dads money went to the important things and moms money paid the bills and if there was any money left then we got food. i will never forget her working all day to come home to my step dad passed out, and make enough food for just me to eat cause we didnt have enough for both of us. id try to share and shed tell me she would eat later... but she didnt. then shed clean the house and put me to bed and i would fall asleep listening to her cry and him yell. she always smiled at me though. she is the strongest person i know. hands down. i watched her for many years endure things i know now were out of her control and and she kept it all together for me. i will never understand completely, but at least now i know why.

we were very poor at the start of my recollection of life. most of the pictures we have validate my memories. to add to it i was really smart at a young age. which might have been a highlight at the time if it were not for the fact poor, intelligent, socially inept children got beat up all the time. at least this was my case. my clothes looked funny and i liked to read and play pretnd by myself and for some odd reason this made fifth graders voilent. so nearly everyday for the better part of one and a half years i ran as fast as i could to get home from school but it was never fast enough. and even better than beating me until i bled was getting tossed into the local trailer park dumpster the height of which was such that i could not escape until my mom came to get me after work. my step dads response was usually to tell me where the fight went wrong and wish me luck next time.

my step dad was that kind of guy. nothing was ever good enough. any thing i attempted to accomplish was judged (pardon my french) half-assed and no good. " if your not gonna do it right, dont do it at all" for 16 years i listened to that. im still mad about it. hypocrite. this im sure has left some underlying personality issue i have yet to face. but im still working out all kinds of kinks. (concerning those non apparent flaws edie, yeah, Mr. flaw right here. just dont let the cat out of the bag. k? our little secret : )

now back to me. basically at 15 i was the angry confused hormone driven product of lifes circumstances to which a very many large number of people fall victim to. when i found the freedom of drugs and alcohol, the comfort and security in friends and the empowerment of earning your own living (by what ever means necessary) i realized that i no longer needed family or school or church or anything that was my life up until then. at that point my anger turned to somethign more than an emotion. it was my life in action. i did everything possible to push myself as far from the hurt as i could.

by the time i was 18 i was well on me way to dropping out of highschool. i was no longer the scrawny unsocial poor athsmatic child i once was. genetics were good to me after all and my football wrestling and weightlifting experiences had led me to belive i was a man. because a man is simply a cussin drinkin fightin s.o.b. right. well thats what i thought. money and drugs were easy to come by. i sold drugs or stole drugs or stole something and sold it for drugs . you get the idea. if i wanted it i took it if i couldnt take it i bought it. if i couldnt have it i would destroy it.

so many overdoses and shootings, and burglaries later i found myself sitting at home telling my girlfriend (now wife) not to worry cause i was goin out for the last time and that would be it. well i didnt know it but it was in fact the very last time. the police showed up like so many time before. we dropped our stuff and ran.... oh how i could run, not like the wind, faster than a speeding bullet perhaps?...ha. but i would run so fast and never get caught. but to my suprise any finally demise. the place i chose to hide out after losing the police officers enroute was in some bushes next to a house where an old lady was sleeping and my commotion had disturbed her so she alerted the police of her delimma and where abouts and ultimately mine.

so i dont like dogs much. if you can imagine. i spent the next few minutes of my life fighting a k-9 officer and by fight i mean i was brutally attacked by a huge dog while police officers stood round (kinda camfire-ish actually, i wouldnt have been suprised if somebody broke out some kumbayah) with thier guns drawn and watched for about two minutes. thats a really long time in dog years. i had it coming though, what else can i say?

none of us knew it at the time but i was dying. as i sat on the squad car and waited i told the officer i didnt feel so good, he laughed and then i went into shock. after arriving at the hospital the nurse tried to take my pulse and it didnt work because my brachial artery was no long attached to my arm. she notified me by looking at the doctor and say with mouth wide open and eyes popping out of her head, he doesnt have a pulse =0 ! this made me feel much better and so to celebrate i went into shock again. two hospitals and a several hour surgery and somebody elses blood later i had a new vein from my leg in my arm and over 100 staples to hold my wounded body together.

this, i must now say, was the greatest thing i have ever experienced. only just above my marriage and birth of my children for the simple fact those things i cherish most are mine today because i met christ in that hospital because of those things. i know people in this world suffer more than i ever began to. and there are still many who struggle through this life with out God full of anger and hurt as a result. but i am most thankful for the trials and circumstances i endured and for the issues im still dealing with as a result. because were it not for all if it. every last bit i would not be today the man i am. i am proud to say i know what it is to be a man. i may be flawed but my heart is new and i have strength in him who i love most. he who love me first and gave his life for me, that i may live. thats the power of christ in my life.

goodnight y'all

oh i almost forgot, them there pictures contain my crew. big guy- chandler, little guy- dawson, middle guy- kellar, and of course our princess nadia. and dont she know it.

7 comments:

  1. Oh, Matt. Oh dear, dear Matt. That was the most amazing testimony. And I already knew it. Well, most of it.

    God bless you, Matthew.

    Your Bible is more worn-out in the handful of years since you've come to know Christ than most "Christians'" Bibles will ever be in their lifetimes.

    God bless you, Matthew...flaws and all.

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  2. p.s. And we want to see pictures of and hear love stories about the one you call Dork.

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  3. For real, yo. I know I was in there somewhere. Surely I should at least get a cameo appearance or something. ;)

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  4. Of course, that's always been my overriding flaw...feeling like someone's cheating me out of my cameo, if not the starring role. And darn it, if I use my winky face again, it'll look redundant. I should've saved it.

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  5. Wow......I think God has BIG plans for you and Chris, Matt. Seriously, you guys are amazing.

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  6. Thanks for sharing that Matt. Meeting Christ in that hospital was nothing less than awesome but what impresses me is that you didn't stop there. Watching you grow (at mach speed) in Christ, lead your family, and become a leader in the church makes you one of the coolest guys I know and gives me a big, silly grin.

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  7. I always am amazed at your testimony. And I never get tired of hearing it because it's so miraculous it makes my head spin. I don't know if you and Chris ever realized this, but before you got saved you and Chris were the worst role models for me. I looked up to you guys because Chris is my big sister and you acted so cool and never seemed to mind me hanging around. Now, you guys are two of the best role models I could ever have.

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