“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. I am the vine, and you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit, apart from me you can do nothing…If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.” -John 15:1-8
I can’t even begin to blog about everything in this passage that speaks to me this week. This verse was the Gospel reading this past Sunday. Let’s just say, metaphorically speaking, that I’ve been bearing a little less fruit than normal lately but I’m running full speed back to the Vine and now God is pruning me like crazy.
There happen to be a few BIG ch-ch-changes going on in my life behind that metaphor. Michael gave his final notice this week that he is leaving his engineering job with a great company to run our business, CrossCutt, full time.
I’m enormously proud of him. 🙂
And I am deeply thankful to every single one of the friends, family members and coworkers who have taken this news with such clear joy and verbal confidence in Michael. It means so much to him and to me as well. It is with serious, incredibly prayerful, and humble discernment that we feel we have been led to this decision, and the success of our business will truly be “to [our] Father’s glory.” 🙂
Please, please pray for my family and for my husband as we make this scary–but strangely natural and peaceful–leap into growing our business into something that will provide for our family. St. Joseph the Provider, pray for us!
Like I always say, I will never be bored married to Michael Franco! 🙂
God has guided you and Michael in this life-changing decision and will continue to do so as you both embark on this new journey. I will keep you all in my prayers. I wish you all the best. <3
By the way, I would like to mention that not every friend and family member we have shared this news with thinks that Michael and I have made a good decision.
To anyone reading this who fell or falls into that category, Michael and I want you to know that we love you, and we know you love us and only want the best for us. We understand that your concerns and disapproval stem from the best of intentions. We are blessed to have people who care about us like that. We love you and we hope that your heart is soon made peaceful and confident where we are concerned.:)
Thank you so much for the encouragement and also your prayers when you think of us! This is such a great opportunity for Mike and I to learn about trusting God and discerning His will for our life and marriage. We are truly taking a leap of Faith on this. It was really an "all-or-nothing," "we either stop here or we jump full-time into this" decision we felt called to discern this spring.
Funny how we named our second child Faith…somehow we KNEW that was supposed to be her name. 🙂
Wow, I'm enormously excited for you and Michael! God bless you on your road to success. It's wonderful to hear/see you putting faith in Him along the way.
Wow! Congrats and best wishes on furthering your endeavor! We will pray for you!