Thoughts from a guy just trying to chase after God!

Just 5 letters. P-R-I-D-E. It is a word that I would have told you 2 weeks ago was something that only occasionally came up in my life, not controlled it. Man was I completely wrong. So let me catch you up if you are unsure of why I would begin a blog like that. So as most of you know my wife and daughters moved back to Wilmington, NC about 2 months ago and it has been so great being back. We didn’t realize how much we missed our church, our community and family and friends. Since we have been back I have been busy bouncing from house to house with the family staying with family and friends, working on a new album and working part time jobs. 

Well about 2 weeks ago I sat down and had coffee with Mike Ashcraft our pastor and great friend. We were talking about how life has been going and what was God doing in my life. As we talked I shared about 3 or 4 things that I was passionate about and Mike finally looked at me and said, “Man you are all over the place.” He said, “you first goal has to be finding a stable job and supporting your family and letting Erin know that you are doing what you say you will to take care of her and Kaylee and Abi.” I knew he was completely right and so that was the first gut check and slow removal of the sin and blinders I was wearing. Then he said you need to focus on the job, supporting your family and walking with God and let the music just flow out of that and if it takes a back seat then it takes a back seat. Second gut check, sin and blinder removal. 

Then Mike said something that haunted me for the next 10 days until I allowed God to reveal it to me. Mike said, “Matt I don’t know why you aren’t on staff at Port City or some other church or why you don’t have a record deal. There is something that I can’t put my finger on and no one can as to why God is not allowing that to happen.” I then looked at Mike and told him something I had not told anyone including my wife and that was how GUILTY I felt for moving my family to Tennessee and driving us in the ground financially and emotionally just to pursue some image and idea of the Christian Music Industry. I said I cannot believe I took my family into the wilderness and made us wander. Then Mike said the most amazing thing. He said, “I have no problem taking your family into the wilderness and going through tough times because you can grow and learn there, you just can’t leave them there, you have to lead them out of the wilderness.” 

I was like WOW, how true. So I knew in that moment it was time to lead my family out of the wilderness and to follow God whole heartedly. In that moment I experienced true brokenness and realized that it was time to finally live in the freedom that Christ has given me and no longer live as a slave to sin and bad choices and disobedience. It was time to live as free in Christ and in the victory He has given me. 

The only thing is that statement Mike made haunted me. What was missing? What could no one put their finger on? If they couldn’t then I know I needed to figure it out before someone else did. I began to pray and ask God to reveal to me what it was. Then I finally took a step back and looked at my life the last 10-15 years and realized something very ugly. I am a PRIDEFUL, PRIDEFUL man. I look back in high school and how I would get mad if someone got a singing part in choir over me, because I knew I was the best singer. I looked back at college when someone needed to be funny at our Christian Student Union meetings that I had to be that guy because I was the funny Christian guy. I looked at how I wanted people to tell me what a great job I do as a worship leader because I believed I was one of the best worship leaders. I looked at when I was on staff at Port City Community Church I was arrogant and prideful to other people and around the staff. I looked at moving to Tennessee, (hear me on this, God used that time and we needed to go there so we could learn all that God needed to teach us). That being said moving to Tennessee was a pride thing because I wanted the record deal and the fame so everyone would know me as a great singer and worship leader and songwriter. I bought a house so that we could look a certain way and a Suburban to have a nice car. All because I was prideful and disobedient to God. I was controlled by Pride, WAS, not anymore.

I told Mike this morning Proverbs 16:18 rings true when it says, “Pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall.” The reason our family kept falling and struggling is because I kept having pride, but I was to blinded and used to living in it that I refused to recognize it.

So I am writing all of this to tell you all of a sin that has entangled me and to ask forgiveness if you have been the victim of my pride. What I mean by that is if I have mistreated you or acted in a way where my pride just overwhelmed you I ask for your forgiveness. If I tried to build myself up around you or make myself out to be more than I am then I apologize. I now realize that my only calling is to follow Jesus and to be a husband to Erin and a father to Kaylee and Abi and our children to come and a provider for my family. All the other stuff is an overflow of me following Christ, my music is, this new CD is, my service at church all of it. I ask all of you if you see me acting in pride to come up and smack me in the head and remind me of this blog and remind me that God has called me to Follow Him and to be a husband, dad and provider. 

Thanks for your support and reading my heart…