Our Wimberley Cabin Retreat: A Gift After the Storm

When I got married, I never thought about all the trials my wife and I would face. I figured rough times were somewhere in the distant future. That distant future was now. Less than two years of marriage and three babies in heaven, my wife and I haven't had an opportunity to really rest. rest. It's been a month since we lost the baby miracle and God blessed us with the cabin. My friend Craig was ignited by the Holy Spirit one day while we were praying and he tells me, "I feel in my spirit I need to treat you and your wife to a cabin out in Wimberly, Texas.

I had never been to a cabin or spent a night in the middle of the woods, but I had a mentor who did. He would always tell me how special the experience experience was. Back in the day, if anyone would try to buy me a gift, I'd decline it. But I openly received this gift from my friend. I also knew my wife would really appreciate it. She worked so hard taking care of me, going to school, serving others that all I could think about was how this would bless her and give my wife a break. Time to breathe.

I enjoy when my wife and I are at peace spending quality time together. This cabin trip would allow us to do just that. It amazes me how God continues to bless me and my family through others. I don't take this favor for granted. See my wife relax, sit back, smile, have joy in her spirit. It brings me great joy. I'm reminded every now and then it's beautiful to just stop, analyze the moment, and simply breathe. [Music] [Music] Photo shoot. Photo shoot. So, check this out. We, me and my wife are in Wimberly right now and we're at a cabin. It's the first time we've ever had this experience.

And I first and for most want to give a shout out to my brother in Christ, Craig, because without him, my wife and I, we would not be here right now. Okay? And so, I do want to give him a phenomenal shout out. You know who you are, brother. didn't have to do this. But now me and my queen get to enjoy a phenomenal weekend. It's a time for my wife and I to just bond with the Lord and ourselves and get away from the city, the hustle and bustle, the grind, and just experience something we've never experienced before. Been a while since I did one of these vlogs.

Um, I got many more coming out as well, too. Stay tuned. a little Wimberly cabin vlog. I'mma see y'all later. All right. [Music] [Applause] Life Life is truly better experiencing when you have someone that you can call your best brain. I don't know what it is, but being able to go to places that I would naturally go myself and to experience it with my wife. For me, it's a beautiful shared experience. Something that throughout the years we can go back and talk about. Remember when we were at Wimberly? Remember when we went to Aruba? Yeah.

And God has truly blessed me because I was so used to doing every single thing by myself at the at the bachelor. I I didn't want to do things with somebody else. I didn't want to drag another woman along with me, you know? I didn't even want to drag really friends along with me. And to just be able to live this life with my best friend, man, is it's really amazing to me to be honest because it continue to push me to grow. For you are all and to you are all. You deserve the glory. Hallelujah. Amen.

You know, when I see my wife, I see somebody that is truly seeking to grow. She reminds me of my myself. To be honest, it's like I'm looking in the mirror and I'm being challenged to grow. I'm being challenged even in my walk with Jesus Christ to be a better individual. How can I be more Christlike so I could love on my wife? So I could be more patient. So I could be more caring. So I can let go of control. That's so that feels so good. Breathe. That breeze. You need a push. No, I can do it.

[Music] [Music] These are the things that I'm learning and I'm working on and my wife is working on those things as well too. And God is so good because as we bask and we dwell in his [Music] [Music] presence, there's just this there's this sense of love that you can't get nowhere else. And the more that I spend time working on my marriage, it's as if I can experience God's God's love through my wife, through the gift that he sent me. And I'm always taking back. There's a joy in marriage. a childlike joy. I was like I think that's it's only two that's ready. Keep that for myself.

[Music] You know how to burn it? He said no. Now, the instruction says that you're supposed to put a law a half inch in front of it, but I actually like to be a rebellious and pit on the side of it and I'm going to show you why. I'm about to bring the food out. Okay, I'm burning it. Okay, so as you can see, our door flame fire start is actually working. So, I'm going to go ahead and p another piece of log on the cross of it side of it because it just catches flames a little better.

All right, we're going to go ahead and let that burn for a few minutes. And in the back of it, what I did with the sitting in the back. I tilt it a little forward and the flame was just going upward. As I was out there making the fire, my wife was inside cooking us some phenomenal phenomenal food. I was getting ready to grill some chicken and enjoy some s'mores with my wife. wife.

Upon coming to Wimberly, this was in my mind one of the moments I was absolutely waiting for to be in the woods woods next to a fire in the middle of nowhere with just myself, my wife, and God. That's why I've been missing. missing. Haven't had lemon in the teas. You know how crucial lemon is for tea. Even the flavor, this is good, babe. This is No, this is not as good as this is topnotch. It's phenomenal. This for people there again. This that type of thing right now. No, that's what it that's now you making tea. Oh, you made a tea today.

No interruptions from the phone, responsibilities, just alone time with my wife. Being able to hear her really speak, tell me how she feels, what she's going through, what's on her mind, and her being able to listen to me undistracted, full, undivided attention. This moment was precisely what we needed for our marriage to continue to grow. It's in this moment where fell deeper in love with my wife and the gift truly that God has blessed me with. I love you, baby. Yo yo yo, check this out. Day two.

Me and my wife this morning got up and it was just beautiful being able to look at this big window that you see right here and just kind of look off into the woods. It was peaceful. We were sitting by the campfire last night conversating, making marshmallows, and um just talking about how grateful we are for God to truly bless us the way that he continues to bless us. And I had told my wife, I said something yesterday. I said, you know, you deserve this.

She's been working so hard doing her school, um, working, serving, and it's one of those things where God sees the type of work that we do. And this trip reminds me that he wants to gift us things. He wants us to relax. He wants us to rest, you know. And she said this, she said, "I don't we don't we don't deserve this, you know. We don't." And when you think about it, all the ways that we fall short of the glory of God, we really don't deserve any of his blessings, right?

But because he loves us so much, we get to experience things that if you had a child yourself, you'd want to bless them, too. We get to experience things that we didn't have to earn. You know, we get to experience things that we didn't have to work for. It's one of those unconditional, hey, I see you. I just want to give this to you. And as I'm thinking about that, it's it's how we got on this trip. Once again, I got to give another shout out to Craig.

It's one of those things where I didn't have to do anything but be who I am, be myself, for somebody to say, you know what, I just want to bless you. You don't got to do nothing for me. You don't got to pay me for this. And I'm still learning how to receive. So, yeah. Today, uh, it's going to be a beautiful day today. The sunset's coming out. We got up early today cuz we want to go on a trail. And not only do we want to go on the trail, we want to see possibly go to a to a body of water. There's a place called the Blue Hole.

We went to Jacob's Well yesterday. No water there. Um, but today we also may go to San Marcos as well, just to dip in the water. So, this just this is such a beautiful experience and I want to have more experiences like this. It just feels so relaxing. Um, and I'm just trying to take all of this in right now, man. One thing that I love, uh, God has just reignited my my love for photography again. Just being able to take photos and I can't wait to go back to the edit room and edit these and what I'm doing this season. I'm blowing my stuff up now.

Large prints, photo books. I will not allow photography to go to waste no more. So, just want to give you a little update on what's going on right now. And I'm excited to start this morning. [Music] [Music] This is McCle coming live in Wimberly, Texas. We saw that there's an artfest. So, we're like, let's go check it out. And so, we're here right now. Steve, um, he dropped us off. God bless him for dropping us off. Bless him. And it's actually beautiful just looking around and just seeing the different art. We haven't gotten to all of them yet, but we are about to walk.

Um, Wimberly is just you can feel the love here. So, check out Wimberly, Texas. Gonna be on my tour specialist. Capture thing. This is nice. What? Oh, it's the canvas. This like the canvas. canvas. [Music] Wow. Fun. I'm from Louisiana. Oh, you are? This is so cool. So, you come here every year? No, this is my first year. Okay. Yeah. Do you have a card? I do not. Okay. I did not bring it. Are you on Instagram? Yes. Okay. So, let me get that one. I'm trying to call people that I like. One of the highlights of our trip to Wimberly was meeting Edwin and Sarah.

Sarah saw my wife and I standing by the water and she asked if she could take our picture. She thought it would look look beautiful. Sarah had the most electrifying electrifying energy, incredible spirit, while Edwin had a flaming testimonial. Both on fire for Jesus Christ. They began pouring into our marriage. It was as if God sent them to Wimberly specifically to minister to my wife and I. The atmosphere was filled with God's presence and we all gathered together and began to pray. Edwin ignited me so much that I had to have him speak a word of encouragement from our leaders on YouTube. His mission is to speak life into people.

I love, you know, if you could just based on what's on your heart right now that you feel you would want somebody to hear, okay, that needs to be said today, what would you share with them? Two things I would say. One, the words you use is the house you live in. And just like in Ezekiel 37, you know, God called Ezekiel to speak life into dry bones. And Ezekiel didn't know. He didn't know what to do. But he asked, "Can these bones live? Only you know, Lord." And what did the Lord say?

He said, "Call the bones to live." He said, "Use your voice and speak life into them." And that's exactly what he did. And then he raised up this powerful army for the Lord. But in addition to that, you know, they didn't have breath yet. So the life he he called the structure of life with his words, which I think that's sometimes what we do is as we call things out like plans that we want to go execute, but to put life into it. That's the final step. And and the Lord said speak life into the breath. He said speak it to the breath. Prophesy to the breath.

And that's what he did. He he he called him to speak breath into the this powerful army that he raised up for the Lord. And that's number one, speak life into yourself, into everything that you're doing and to the the people that are around you. But number two, you know, you're a vessel. You know 2 Corinthians 4:7 it says that we have this treasure in earth and vessels to show that this all surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. Amen. So speak life into that vessel because that's all you that's all any of us are.

We are we are a vessel for either the world to fill our the vessel up with the things of this world or we're a vessel of life and that's from the Lord. So speak life into to what God has called you to be, which is a container, an everyday container for him. Wherever you go with everyone you meet and all the people that you know, like you are a vessel of encouragement, of love, of life, of all these things, for all the people that God's put in your in your world.

And um I'm speaking with Mike today, you know, and he's been a perfect amazing vessel for the Lord, which is why I'm even saying anything right now. So, it just uh what's in my heart right now, like what's in my heart is um I've never felt more um connected to the Lord. Amen. Just in an ordinary place um at the most perfect time, which was his time. It wasn't mine. So, I feel blessed. I feel honored and and I feel loved by the Lord. Jeremiah Jeremiah 17:7, "Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord.

He is like a tree planted by water that sends out its root by the stream and does not fear when he comes for its leaves remain green and is not anxious in the year of drought for it does not cease to bear fruit. The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately sick. Who could understand it? I the Lord search the heart and test the mind to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds.