I interrupt this blog series....

Oh you guys, I am so SO excited to break up the seriousness of my past couple of posts to bring you this EXCITING, newly released video from Visiting Orphans (VO).  I'm sure you remember that VO is the mission-sending organization I have traveled to Africa with the past two summers, and will be leading a trip with this December. I am so honored to be part of a team of bloggers who have the privilege of presenting this fresh look at VO today.  I just watched the video myself for the first time this morning, and I cried through the whole thing.  Because I know these people.  I know their hearts.  I know their passion is to see the world changed - to BE the change - through bringing the love of Jesus to the nations. 

I know first-hand that VO is committed to seeing lives transformed by empowering and equipping Christ-followers to GO to the nations, BE focused on relationship, and LOVE like Christ by caring for children and communities world-wide.  GO. BE. LOVE.  It's about so much more than just a cool trip to tell your friends about.  It's about being the very hands and feet of Jesus.

I know sometimes it's hard to pause in the middle of your morning blog-surfing to watch a 10-minute video (ok, 11 minutes), but y'all, please please take just a few minutes (ok, 11) to stop and watch this beautiful video.  I so want to share with all of you the amazing organization that has captured my heart, and which God has used and is using to send me to the nations. Do it for me?



You can read more about VO's vision and their mission at these links.

And if your heart has been stirred?  If you feel a tugging inside to GO. BE. LOVE. to the nations?  Leave me a comment right here and I can hook you up!  (especially if that tug should be pulling you toward Uganda this December!)

And then it was over. Or not.

Apparently it's harder to blog from Africa than I thought it would be. :)

Not just because of the time constraints - we were on the go every day from breakfast through late dinners - but also because of the sheer overwhelmingness of what we saw and did every day.  Where do you even start?  It's like coming home and having someone ask "How was your trip?"  There's just no easy response.

Good?  Amazing?  Incredible.  Overwhelming.

Life changing.

Sunrise over the Atlantic Ocean.

How many things in life can we say truly are Life Changing?  Meaning, they truly, literally CHANGE your very life?

Remember my New Year's Quest to Be Different?  I pray with all my heart that the last two summers I spent in Africa will absolutely CHANGE the way I live my life.  Because it needs to be changed.  I don't for one single second believe God allowed me to go on these two incredible journeys so that I could come home and say, "Wow, that was amazing," and go back to life as usual.  What would be the point in that?

I don't know what that means, or what it looks like, or what it will entail going forward, but I'm going to be praying for it with all my heart.  Because I want to be different.  And I want my family to be different.  And I want us to MAKE a difference.

And so.  With that, let's talk about Africa. ;)

Airport in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

Day two of our adventure (see day one in the previous post) was supposed to be THE BIG DAY, when we would visit a leper village near Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, called Korah, as well as a community that was literally built on top of the trash dump.

Look at this picture below.  Do you see the people there?  Those people don't VISIT the dump every day to dig through the trash.....they LIVE there.  Are you getting this?  They LIVE in little shacks and shanties that they have built from pieces of tin and cardboard - right. on. top. of. the. trash. dump. (oh, and all those flecks you see in the sky?  vultures.)

They live there every single minute of every single day.  Their children are born there.  They scrounge through the GARBAGE to find food to feed their families.  Truly....truly....stop and think about that existence for a minute.  Your family.  Your children.  THIS is why we can't go on living our lives blind to the rest of the world.

The government of Addis has recently closed the trash dump to groups (gee, I wonder why), and so we weren't allowed to visit the villagers who live there.  We were, however, able to visit Korah, which began as a leper colony right next to the trash dump.  About 75 years ago, the government established Korah as a "throw-away" village, where lepers were cast out of the city to live in seclusion....exactly like in Bible times. 

Today there are thousands of people who live in Korah (the last estimate I read was 130,000), and they are considered the lowest of the low.  They are so "forgotten", in fact, that many people in the capital city of Addis Ababa - of which Korah is a part, a burrough, if you will - don't even know it EXISTS.

The children coming to greet us! :)

Let me tell you a story about one of the children of Korah.  His name is Sammy.  Both of Sammy's parents were lepers.  His father eventually died of leprosy, leaving Sammy alone in Korah with his mother and sister.  When Sammy was about 12 (14?) years old, a Young Life team visited Korah, and Sammy met a man who took an interest in him, and through a series of events, eventually helped Sammy find Jesus, get out of Korah, and get an education.  [You can read more of Sammy's store here.]

Sammy has now returned to Korah, and he's making it his life's work to change the lives of the people who live there.  He has started a ministry called Great Hope, which has several arms under its canopy: a feeding program; a daycare where moms can leave their children while they work; a ministry called Mission Ethiopia, where the women of Korah make bead necklaces to sell and earn money; another ministry called Project 61 that secures sponsors for the children of Korah, whereby they can get out of the village and attend boarding school; and he's just now starting to build a coffee shop RIGHT IN THE VILLAGE, where visiting teams can buy coffee (brewed or unbrewed) to help support his other ministries.

And he's 26 years old.

THIS is someone whose life was changed, and who is doing the most he can to make a difference in the world.  A huge difference.  I am totally amazed at all he's doing with the opportunities God has given him.

Meet Sammy.  What an incredible (and handsome!) young man of God.

So...what did we do in Korah?

Walked.
Saw.
Played.
Loved.
Learned.
Changed.

We walked through a large portion of the village, playing with and loving on kids along the way, greeting the villagers with "Selam", which means, "Peace".  We touched and hugged and held hands with lepers - those who may not have felt the love of human touch in many, many years.  We had the humbling honor of being the hands of Jesus.

We watched women hand-spinning cotton into thread and then watched the men hand-loom the thread into fabric, creating with their hands the very sustenance of their lives.  I loved this.  Loved witnessing the way God has brought provision to this forgotten community and given them a means of supporting themselves and their families, when before there was no hope but what they could find on the dump.

We also had the opportunity to serve with our hands by painting three rooms of the building where the women of Mission Ethiopia make beads out of clay and paper, and then use those beads to make necklaces which, again, they can sell to provide income for their families.  A wholesome, alternative means of income.  Alternative to....the things they were forced to resort to before.

Spinning cotton into thread.

Weaving the thread into fabric.

One of the rooms we painted. :)

Making clay beads in their lovely new blue room!

And, maybe most importantly, we were changed.  Hopefully forever.  We learned that life is about so much more than anything we normally think about on a typical day in America.  We learned that following Jesus is about so much more than just dressing up for church and attending Bible study and picnics.  We saw with our own eyes what it means to BE the body of Christ.

Please, please take a few minutes to watch this video about Korah.  This isn't our team - but it will give you a very good idea about what Korah is like (and you'll see Sammy several times in the video as well! :)

And then take a minute and ask God what He wants you to do with what you've seen.  Share it?  Tell others?  Facebook?  Blog?  Sponsor a child?  Find other ministries to support and get involved with? 

Because I promise you, whether you get involved with Korah and Great Hope Ministry or not....I know God wants you - wants all of us - to do something.

Once our eyes are opened we can't pretend we don't know what to do. God, who weighs our hearts and keeps our souls, knows we know and holds us responsible to act. Proverbs 24:12

Bringing home Mareto

Oh my goodness, this is one of the most beautiful adoption videos I've ever seen. I cried and cried through this video...and I don't even know these people. :) Grab a tissue and watch....

It's not about the apples.

I was standing in the produce section at Wal*Mart when it slapped me in the face struck me.

Just a few hours earlier I'd been at home reading Katie Davis's blog. The Mister and I were looking at a picture of some children carrying plastic sacks on their heads, and I was telling him how the kids who came to Amazima while we were there would literally fight over unripened mangos as they knocked them out of the trees with a giant stick. They would scurry around, scooping up the hard, green fruit, filling their little torn, dirty plastic bags, then guarding them like a prize. The younger kids often lost their treasure to the older ones.



Because they're hungry. Truly hungry. The kind of hunger my kids and I have never known.

And there I stood in Wal*Mart, passing over one apple after another after another. Because this one had a broken spot in the peel, and that one had a yellow place on one side, and another had a small bruise. And as I stood there, the picture of the children at Amazima came back to me. And I hung my head, wondering if everyone else around me was shaking their head at my pickiness. I sighed and quickly scooped a couple of apples into my sack.

Most of the time I’m overwhelmed with trying to figure out how I can afford to buy groceries while avoiding the BPAs in canned foods, the pesticides in fresh foods, the nitrates and nitrites in lunch meat, the hormones in milk, and on and on (and on). And just this week I read this post about how the chocolate I buy is most likely produced by child slaves. Oh. My. Word. (I did skip the Hershey’s cocoa at the store. Haven’t quite figured out what I’m gonna do about that yet.)

All the way home from the store I thought about this. God is messing with my heart, and I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do about it. Does this mean I’m supposed to choose the worse-looking fruit at Wal*Mart? Am I supposed to skip the luxury of fruit altogether? Is it wrong for me to spend more for organic? Should we be eating beans and rice every day because that’s all some of these children in Uganda get?



I can’t quite talk about the chocolate issue yet, but here’s what I think about the fruit. I don’t think it’s really about the fruit. Or about buying organic, or eating rice and beans every day. I think it’s about......hold on......wait for it......our hearts.

And that doesn't just mean how we feel about those who have less, but the action we're willing to take.

The issue is, what are we DOING about the children who eat nothing but rice and beans every day (if they even get to eat every day) while we eat a vast array of perfect, fresh, organic fruit and every other kind of food we could possibly ever dream of? (And obviously, this analogy could be applied to any number of different scenarios.) Are we ignoring them? Looking the other way? Shaking our heads and saying “how sad” while we go about life as usual? Because if we are, that’s when something’s wrong.

It's not about feeling guilty for what we have. God is the One who decided where we would be born, where we would live, and (though open to debate) what jobs we would have. But while I don't think we’re supposed to go through life feeling guilty, I think we ARE supposed to take the blessings we’ve been given and use them for the good of others. God didn’t give us all this stuff just so we could sit in our luxury and satisfy our own insatiable desires. He has given us what we have so that we can give and share and help others.

Every blessing we have been given – every gift, every talent, every ability, every financial gain – is given to us for the purpose of serving others.

“Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s grace in its various forms.” 1 Peter 4:10 (emphasis mine)
"Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, "Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead." James 2:15-17
“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’ Then the King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’” Matt. 25:37-40
“From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.” Luke 12:48
What I think God was saying to me in the produce section at Wal*Mart was not, “Don’t be so picky about your apples,” but simply “Remember”.

• Remember that the vast majority of people in the world don’t have the luxury of being picky with their fruit (or anything else they eat, for that matter).


• Remember that I have been blessed to be a blessing. It’s not just a pretty cliché, it’s TRUTH.


• Remember that I am among the wealthiest people in the world - when compared to the rest of the world – and with that wealth comes great responsibility.


• Remember that saying, “I felt sad for them” isn’t going to be the right answer when Jesus asks me what I did about the people I saw all around me in dire need.

Please know that I am so very, very far from doing this right. But I'm trying to learn. I want to make a difference. I want to BE different.

Oh Jesus, change my heart. Lord, I’m so selfish and me-focused. I hurry through life only looking out for myself and my own family. Continue to break my heart for the things that break Yours, and then give me the COURAGE to step out of my comfort zone and do something about it. Make me know Your ways, Oh Lord, teach me Your paths. Lead me in Your truth and teach me. (Ps. 25:4-5)

"Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others." Phil. 2:3-4
I am only one; but still I am one. I cannot do everything; but still I can do something; and because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do the something that I can do. ~Edward Everett Hale

4 days....

This video was created by one of the Visiting Orphans team members from the March 2011 team. These are some of the very same places and very same kids I will be visiting in just a few days!

Pure Religion: Uganda 2011 with Visiting Orphans from Jennifer Hanson on Vimeo.

When I see the beautiful faces of these precious kids, it almost makes me forget about the 18 hours on an airplane that it will take for me to get to them. Almost. :)

Addis Ababa, Ethiopa

The City of Addis - A short documentary from Session 7 Media on Vimeo.

The Roller Coaster

A year or so ago, I told one of my friends, "I feel like my life is a roller coaster, and I'm hanging on to a bar on the back, with my feet flailing out behind me, being whipped and jerked around, just trying to hold on for dear life."

I remember the feeling well. Oh, do I remember. Mostly because that feeling's never quite gone completely away. And recently it's started coming back again.

Uganda (in 34 days!!).

Fundraising.

Shots.

And more shots.

End of the school year craziness.

Buddy-field day, sponsored by PTA.

5th grade graduation (ugh).

Preparing for middle school (double-ugh. Band instrument selection last night. Tour of the school in a few weeks.)

Trying to find summer childcare (my sitter from last year has declined for this year....what does that mean?)

Easter (does it mean I'm a terrible person if I'm glad it's over?)

Garage sale #2 this weekend.

Scrounging for tables and clothes hangers for the garage sale.

Car (truck) trouble.


And....you know....the rest of life.

I know. This is life. It's everybody's life. I just don't seem to deal with it as well as most people. Yesterday morning after devotions, I told Jacob, "You need to hop up and go get ready for school." He just sat there playing with his chocolate milk cup. I said, "Do you know it gives me stress when you don't obey the first time?" He said, "You always have stress. You need to stop being stressed. It'll give you a heart attack."

sigh.

He's right. I'm not sure how to do that, though. Is it possible to just stop being your personality type? {I love studying personality types. There are a jillion different systems out there - the colors, the animals, the DiSC, Myers-Briggs, even Bible characters - I'm Moses. :) But the one that makes the most sense in my brain is the one that was developed in the first century by Galen. In his model, I'm a melancholy. Melancholies tend to be perfectionistic and pessimistic. Overly analytical (CPA, anyone?). Good formula for stress, huh?} Researchers tend to agree that your basic personality type is primarily biological. Nature, not nuture. So how do you go about changing who your DNA has made you to be?

A good start for me was when I read this post from Amy at Building the Blocks. I find myself asking God the same question Amy asked: "Why did You think I could handle this?" And then I read all the way to the end.

Um, kinda puts my roller coaster life in perspective.

Disturb Us, Lord

Disclaimer: Blogger's spacing problems are about to drive me out of my little mind. I could probably fix all the spacing weirdness, but it would take forever and I'm not really in the mood right now. :) I can't figure out why none of the blogs I read seem to be having this problem? Maybe they're just better people than I am and take the time to fix it! Sorry - hope you can bear with me!

I saw this poem on Beth Moore's blog a couple of years ago. It really struck a chord with me at the time, and even more so now with my upcoming trip to Uganda.

Disturb us, Lord, when we are too well pleased with ourselves,

When our dreams have come true because we have dreamed too little,

When we arrived safely

because we sailed too close to the shore.

Disturb us, Lord, when,

With the abundance of things we possess

we have lost our thirst for the waters of life;

Having fallen in love with life,

we have ceased to dream of eternity,

And in our efforts to build a new earth,

we have allowed our vision of the new Heaven to dim.

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly,

To venture on wider seas

where storms will show Your mastery;

Where losing sight of land, we shall find the stars.

We ask You to push back the horizons of our hopes;

And to push into the future in strength, courage, hope, and love.

[Sir Francis Drake]

Seems everywhere I turn lately, God is compelling me to make the decision to go deeper with Him. Further. To make a choice. A deliberate choice. A hard choice. Not one I want to make flippantly or half-heartedly.

I'm not talking about spending more time in Bible study, at church, or necessarily even in serving or in prayer. I'm talking about the kind of decision that makes my heart start to pound. I'm talking about the "I will follow You anywhere, no matter what" prayer. Have you ever prayed the "no matter what" prayer? Really no matter what? Not me. It scares me. It scares the bejeebers out of me.

I want to do a much better job of living my faith, not just proclaiming it. To love with my actions, not just my words. God is stirring in me a yearning to be the body of Christ - His hands and feet. Jesus doesn't have a physical body on earth anymore. But when His Spirit lives inside us, WE become His physical body. So if He were physically on the earth today, would He be spending time in church? Sure. Some. On a committee? Um, well. Going to Bible study? Perhaps. But where did we mostly see Him when He was on earth? Spending time with His Father and serving others.

So if we are His physical body now - if I am part of His physical body now - where do I need to be spending my time? Where HE would. I am HIS body. I should be spending time with His/my Father, and serving the least of these.

Man, as I get closer and closer to Uganda, this scripture is becoming louder and louder in my spirit:

And the king will reply, "I tell you the truth. Whatever you did for one of the least of these, my brothers, you did for me." Matt 25:40

What do I do with that? Do I hand Jesus a $5 bill at the stop light? Do I give Him a sackful of my children's too-small and worn-out clothes? Do I send Him a "one-time gift" through some charitable organization and feel like I've done my part? Or do I give Him my all? My kids' best, cutest clothes? Or maybe the money I was saving for a new TV or a vacation for my family? Do I invite Him over for supper? Do I go out of my way to help or offer assistance when it doesn't fit into my schedule, or when my kids are tired and cranky and I'm tired and frustrated and I just don't want to? No. I don't. I don't.

And how can I be the body of Christ if I don't?

I'm not sure where this post is going. Maybe nowhere - just my random thoughts swirling around looking for some sense and order. Just some things I've been mulling over and pondering lately in regards to my own claims of Christianity. I'm starting to think that being the body of Christ looks far different than what I want it to. Than what I'm used to. Than what most (?) people are used to.

Beth says God never allows us to be sifted unless there is something in us that NEEDS sifting. I know there is MUCH in me that needs to be sifted. I'm hoping (dare I say praying?) some things will be sifted out of me in Uganda. (Oh Lord, please sift gently!) Tomorrow Soon, hopefully, I want to show you something that has blown a hole in my nice, neat little picture of the Ugandan adventure I'm about to go on. It is shaking me to the core -- sifting, perhaps? And I'm disturbed and grateful all at the same time.

Could you use a vacation?

Wow, that's the understatement of this 16-day-old year. :)

Wanted to pop in real quick to let you guys know about an amazing opportunity....for you AND for a sweet family trying to bring home two precious treasures from Eastern Europe. Meet the Eichhorn family. These already-parents-of-four are stepping out in faith and doing everything in their power to bring home two more precious children from Reece's Rainbow who are waiting for their forever families. Ohhh, just wait 'til you see their SWEET kids and the beautiful little girl and boy they are trying to bring home!

Jeff and Candice need our help. They are planning to leave for Europe in just 8 days to bring home these little ones, but they are still in need of over $2500 in travel expenses!! They are trying so desperately to bring these children home, and we have an opportunity to help. To be the hands and feet of Christ. To BE the church. Not everyone can go....not everyone is called to adopt....but all can help, either through prayer or through giving, or both!

Won't you join me in praying for the Eichhorns, asking God to show His mighty hand and work miracles on their behalf? And if you might consider helping them out financially....they are having an AMAZING giveaway on their blog for a 7 night stay at Sand Castle One Condominiums in Indian Shores, Florida!! How cool is that? The condo sits right on the beach, sleeps up to 7, has a washer/dryer, and its own heated pool and jacuzzi. Awesome!

AND...there's a 2nd prize too: a Nintendo Wii with Wii Sports, Wii Sports Resort, and Wii Motion Plus (Brand New in Box)

The more you donate, the more chances you have to win. And the closer these two little ones will be to sleeping in their own beds at home with their forever family.

But here's the clincher - TODAY (Sunday, Jan. 16) is the last day to enter the giveaway. So don't delay! Hop on over to their place, click on the Chip In button, help bring two children home, and receive an entry (or several) to win this fabulous week-long vacation! {and if you win, I get to go too since you heard about it here, right? ;) }

Drawn From Water

"It Began with Bale" from Drawn From Water on Vimeo.

You can help.
www.drawnfromwater.org

Show Hope

From the Show Hope website:

Show Hope is a non-profit organization that mobilizes individuals and communities to care for orphans and provide waiting children with families by giving grants to those adopting.

Established in 2003 as Shaohannah’s Hope, Steven Curtis Chapman and his wife, Mary Beth initially founded Show Hope out of their desire to see more children find their way into forever families. Though many families they talked to were willing to adopt, the financial costs to adoption were simply too high.

Originally named after the Chapman’s first adopted daughter, Shaohannah Hope Chapman, Shaohannah’s Hope has grown far beyond the initial vision of helping a few orphans find homes. In 2009, after changing the name to Show Hope, this organization has seen an amazing explosion in growth. From a six-story caring facility in China, equipped to provide surgeries and medical care to special needs orphans, to multiplying the effects of the adoption grant program by assisting churches in setting up their own adoption funds, Show Hope continues to expand its remarkable worldwide impact.

I feel like I really have to say something about the verse quoted in this video. James 1:27 in fact says "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans AND WIDOWS in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." (NIV)

I get frustrated when so often only half of this scripture is quoted by adoption advocates. The verse says to care for orphans AND WIDOWS. And it also says that part of "pure and faultless religion" is to keep [your]self from being polluted by the world. But somehow the "caring for orphans" part is often all that's quoted as qualifying as pure religion that's acceptable to God.

That being said, I love Show Hope. I love their heart, and I believe in what they are doing. And you know that I L.O.V.E. the Chapman family and all that they stand for. Please pause for a moment and consider what part you might be able to play in caring for orphans (and widows!). Ask God. I'm pretty sure He would be happy to give you some ideas. :)

Wild Olive Tees - Hope for Haiti

Hey friends, just wanted to pop in real quick and let you know about this fabulous website I found. If you already know about it, act surprised anyway, k?

It's called Wild Olive Tees, and they have the greatest t-shirts evah. I LOVE them. Check them out for yourself here. They are cute and have awesome scriptures on the back AND they have kids sizes AND the best part is that they give 10% of all their profit to Christian charities.

(click the word "back" below each of the t-shirt pictures below to see the back of the shirt on their website - remember, they all have scriptures on the back)

I love this one:

{back}

And this one:
(it says "transform your mind" - isn't her hair adorable?)

{back}

And these:

(love unfailing)

{back}

(beauty from ashes)

{back}

But this one is my absolute favorite (not so much the color, but the verse):

{back}

It says "Redeemed", and the scripture on the back is Isaiah 44:22, "I have swept away your sins like the morning mists. I have scattered your offenses like the clouds. Oh, return to Me, for I have paid the price to set you free."

Isn't it beautiful?

So here's the main point of this post. Wild Olive has just launched this new t-shirt called HOPE:

The scripture below the word "Hope" is Matthew 12:21 "and His name will be the Hope of all the world." 100% of the proceeds from the sale of this shirt will go to help victims of the earthquake in Haiti. 100%

You can order a Hope t-shirt for yourself....AND you can send a second shirt to a person in Haiti who is in need of some hope.

I hope you'll head over to their site and check out the Hope for Haiti shirt and all their shirts....love them!

More about Haiti....

I'm not back to say more about Haiti. There is nothing I could say that would be of any value or intelligence. I am speechless. Dumbstruck. I cannot fathom the fact that they were struck by another earthquake today. Lord Jesus....

I do, however, want to share with you some words that others have written in response to this horrendous tragedy - words that made me think, made me pray, made me want to DO SOMETHING...DO MORE.

Please take a few minutes to read these posts from....

Lysa TerKeurst

Beth Moore

Sincerely Anna

Linny at A Place Called Simplicity

Matt and Pam McCormick

Matt and Pam McCormick have been missionairies in Haiti for 3 years (you'll read more from Pam on Beth Moore's blog). Pam has just returned to the U.S. for the birth of their 3rd child, but Matt is still in Haiti and is writing almost daily about the things he and his team are doing to help the relief effort. It is amazing.

Most of all friends....pray. Please pray - both for Haiti and for us (me and you) - that we would be willing to hear and obey whatever God would have us do to be the hands and feet of Christ.

Sweet Sleep

This entire post is copied from Angie at Bring the Rain....it really touched my heart, and one way I can DO SOMETHING to help is to pass the info along to you (I will also be sending a donation to Sweet Sleep). I hope you will visit their website and consider how you might be able to help. The cost of a mosquito net is only $8.00....that's 2 coffees from Starbucks....a Sonic Brown Bag Special....half the price of a CD....less than a movie ticket....you get the idea... :) Love you, friends!

Six years ago my friend, Jen Gash, started an organization called Sweet Sleep after seeing the conditions of children’s beds in an Eastern European orphanage. Today, Sweet Sleep provides beds and bedding for orphaned and abandoned children around the world (http://www.sweetsleep.org/). They don’t just give the beds to orphans, they communicate God’s intentional creation of each child and His unconditional, unending love. They celebrate the children by throwing the biggest birthday party in the country. The children are even given Bibles in their own language and prayed with over their new beds. Finally, the children are told that when they lay down at night and pull the cozy new covers up around them, it is God---giving them a hug.

One week from today Jen will leave for Uganda where she’ll spend several weeks in the northern region of Gulu. This region has been in a brutal and senseless war for the last 22 years. A rebel army known as the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) has been terrorizing the North, attacking villages during the night. During an attack, LRA soldiers kill anyone they want and force the children of these villages to kill their parents or be killed themselves. The children who are left alive are then kidnapped into the LRA army and forced to become child soldiers. These children have lived through tremendous atrocities.

Recently this war entered into a time of peace. However, there are 1 million people still living in displacement camps in Gulu; three-quarters of those people are children living in child-headed households. These children have lost their parents and their grandparents---two generations of people to protect and care for them, to tell them stories about who they are and who they could be, to teach them stories about God and how to live according to His word.

This Christmas---while Jen is in Uganda, Sweet Sleep hopes to give beds and Bibles to 450 children. If the children can lie in their new beds and know they are loved and protected and, if they can claim a verse they’ve learned which reminds them of this knowledge, they can begin to have little victories over the fear that grips them. That’s when peace and hope and love can slowly come to their little hearts.

But, Sweet Sleep needs our help.

218 more children still need beds ($88 each). Together, you and I can work to change and save lives. Here’s what is still needed, you can determine which opportunity suits you best:
· 218 mosquito nets. Malaria kills more people in Uganda than HIV/AIDS. Treated nets are $8 each.
· Mattresses for 218 children so they will be able to sleep up off of the ground for the first time in their lives. Mattresses are $50.
· Can you imagine not having a blanket to warm you during these chilly nights or sheets to sleep in? 218 more children still need to be able to be warm and snuggly. They can for just $30.
· Bibles are $10 each. There are 450 households for a total of $4,500.

You can make a gift right now by going to www.sweetsleep.org/donate or you can send your contributions to Sweet Sleep, PO Box 40486, Nashville, TN 37204 with “Gulu” in the special comments box online or in the memo line of your check. All gifts are 100% tax-deductible. If you still need a great idea for a Christmas gift, you can even make this a donation in honor or memory of someone and they’ll receive a card from Sweet Sleep telling about their special gift. You can read more about this at www.sweetsleep.org/givethegift.

Thanks friends…..for changing and saving lives.

I'm telling you....it's EVERYWHERE

If you haven't read my post from Thursday, today's post will make more sense if you take a minute (or ten....sorry, it's a bit long) to go back and read it.

So, I wrote that post on Thursday.

Friday night, Hubby just happened to be out of town and I had planned to have dinner with a friend. My friend just happened to call around 5:30 saying she wasn't feeling well and thought she should stay home. I had already made plans to take Kloe and Jacob to my cousin's house - who they LOVE - for the evening, and I knew they would be hugely disappointed if I cancelled, so I just happened to decide that I'd go ahead and take them and spend an evening by myself (ahhhh....bliss!).

I dropped the kids off and, not knowing what else to do, headed for home. My route home just happened to pass right by Lifeway Christian Store, and I remembered there were some things in their sale flier that I had wanted to look at, so I just happened to stop in.

[Let me interrupt this post to say I spent an hour and a half at Lifeway, BY MYSELF, with no one hanging on me, no one fighting, no one pulling $5,000 (ok, maybe that's a minor exaggeration) breakable glass things off the shelf, no one saying, "Mom, can I have this? Mom, I want this! Mom, why can't I have this? Mom, can we go now? Mom, I'm tired. Mom, when can we leave? Mo-o-o-o-m!" Did I mention it was bliss?]

I was browsing aimlessly through the books, taking my sweet time, only looking at the ones with really cheap sale tags, and I just happened to notice this book called, She Did What She Could by Elisa Morgan. I had never heard of the book or the author before. Did you catch that? Never heard of 'em. I have no idea why I just happened to pick up that book in particular. The cover wasn't particularly intriguing. I wasn't being drawn by a familiar name like Beth Moore or Lysa TerKeurst. No idea. Totally random (yeah...).

I picked up the book and turned it over to read the back.

"Most of us care. We really do. We care about poverty and injustice, about orphans and the sick."

Now I was intrigued.

"And yet, weighed down by the everyday tasks of bringing home a paycheck, putting food on the table, and shuttling kids around, we question our ability to make a difference."

I started to feel....you know....that feeling you get in the pit of your stomach.

"Bombarded by one celebrity help-the-world-athon after another, we shrug our shoulders in futility and do absolutely nothing."

The feeling....the stomach feeling....was getting stronger.

I opened the book and started skimming through the introduction.

The author talked about how she had been watching a story on NBC Nightly News one night. A story about the abuse of mentally challenged adults in Serbia.

"I found myself standing in the middle of my family room, hands raised in the air, howling. Then a sob erupted, and tears started down my face."

She goes on to say that she is no stranger to tragedy, having witnessed her share of poverty, need, oppression, injustice. She didn't know why this one story would have impacted her in such a way.

"But something cracked me open that night, and like a foot jammed in a doorway, it wouldn't let me close back down."

And there they were.

Those two words....

Do something.

Seriously.

This small, previously unknown, sale-tagged book is now on my bedside table.

Thankful Thursday - Do Something with the Red Letters

I finally finished reading Red Letters: Living a Faith that Bleeds, by Tom Davis. I guess you can tell it takes me a long time to finish a book. That's not just because I'm not the fastest reader on the block, but mostly because I only get to read in 2-3 minute snippets about 2 or 3 times a week. My only quiet reading time is the last few minutes of my day, right before I fall asleep...which usually happens about 3.2 minutes after I lay my head on the pillow. By the time I fall into bed every night I am so exhausted I can't read for long. And lots of nights I can't even manage the 2-3 minutes.

Being a working mom means there's no time during the day for doing laundry or running errands or picking up around the house or cleaning the bathtub or ironing or cleaning the fuzzy stuff out of the refrigerator or sorting piles of papers or paying bills or buying groceries or even just planning what needs to be done and making a list....or any of the other 427 jobs a mom is called upon to do.

So all of those things have to be done between 3:30, when I get home from picking the kids up from school, and 5:00, when I try to start dinner. Add in after-school snacks and homework, and it's a really tight squeeze. What about my Fridays off, you ask? Well, I volunteer in Jacob's classroom from 8:30 to 10:00, then come home, plan a menu (which generally takes me FOREVER because I can't ever come up with good ideas that will please a non-pasta-eating husband and that we're not desperately tired of), make a grocery list (which also takes me a fair amount of time), and go to the grocery store. I usually get home in time to unload the groceries, put them all away, grab a bite to eat, have a spare half hour or so, and then head back up to school to pick up the kids.

On Saturdays we do regular house cleaning, but that's also the day we have sports, birthday parties, haircuts, kid dates, occasional church activities....you know how it is. Not just a whole lot gets done around here on Saturdays either. Hence, my night-time weariness.

ANYHOO....that was huge digression drama. I apologize. What I was really trying to tell you is that I FINALLY finished the book!

And I'm not mentioning the fact that I kept avoiding it for days at a time because of how it made me feel like I'd been punched in the stomach. Conviction tends to do that to me.

Have you guys read it? It is a heavy hitter. I don't recommend reading it if you're not ready to hear from God.

Actually, maybe I'm the only one who needed the heavy-hitting.

The premise of the book is that the Christian church is failing in the mandate to give our lives away for the sake of Christ....to be His hands and feet to a hurting world. In other words, we are not living out the Red Letters - Christ's words. We (I) like to take our families to church, sing praise songs, put a few dollars - maybe even more than a few - in the offering, wear t-shirts with Christian slogans on them, go to Bible study, memorize scripture with our (my) kids....and stay in our (my) nice, safe comfort zones while the world around us (me) is dying. We are talking our Christianity without walking it.

I'm certainly no book-reviewer, but I will say I think he's right on the mark.

"What good is it, dear brothers and sisters, if you say you have faith but don’t show it by your actions? Can that kind of faith save anyone? Suppose you see a brother or sister who has no food or clothing, and you say, “Good-bye and have a good day; stay warm and eat well” — but then you don’t give that person any food or clothing. What good does that do? So you see, faith by itself isn’t enough. Unless it produces good deeds, it is dead and useless." James 2:14-17 (NLT)

Please hear what I am saying. I am NOT saying I think every person who calls themselves a Christian is shirking their responsibility as a Christ-follower. What I do think is that the American church as a whole (including ME) has gotten comfortable in our well-protected, Christian-nation environment (including ME), and it gets really easy to think we (I) can just pray for someone and give an offering and everything will be alright. It can be ugly to get our (my) hands dirty by digging in and actually giving MY life away to serve the least of the least.

Read slowly and let these statistics soak in for a minute:

• 28 million children die from curable diseases each year

• 17 million children die from malnutrition and starvation each year

• 2.2 million children worldwide are living with HIV

• 33% of the world's population is malnourished....1/3 of the world. How can that be when we throw food away by the truckload in this country?

• 20% of the world's population has no access to clean water

• 10 million children are involved in the sex industry....children!!

• 100 million children in the world live on the streets

• 143 million children are orphans

No one can fix it all. But it's wrong to think that because we can't do it all - or can't even do a lot - that we should do nothing.

For a long time now, almost a year in fact, God has been repeating two words over and over and over to my heart.

Do something.

Do something.

Do something.

It's everywhere I turn. Books. Magazines. Sermons. Songs. Blogs. Fliers. TV. Seriously....EVERYWHERE....do something.

At times it's actually gotten humorous. I'm telling you, it's every.where. Even an investing seminar I went to.

For the longest time I kept asking, "What, God? Do what? If You'll just tell me what something You want me to to, I'll do it!"

Honestly sometimes God cracks me up. Although I'm sure He wasn't laughing at how dense I was being. One day not too long ago I came across this post by Amy at Building the Blocks. Did you catch it? It's there, at the end.

Do something. Anything.

Could God GET any clearer? (don't answer that)

Wanna know something? That question I kept asking God? The "what do You want me to do?" question? It was my ticket to doing nothing. See, I didn't know it at the time, but as long as I kept asking the question, I was avoiding the doing. I was so afraid of doing the wrong thing, or spending my money and efforts in the wrong place, that I did nothing.

Really....is there a wrong place to spend our efforts in helping someone who's hurting and in need? Is there a wrong someone to help? Is there a wrong time to be the hands and feet of Christ? I wanted God to lay it all out for me. I wanted Him to say, "This person, on this day, will need this sort of help from you. That's what I want you to do."

Or, "I want you to send this amount of money to this worthy cause on this day during this specific campaign."

What I didn't realize is that I didn't want to make a choice. I was overwhelmed by the enormous volume of need in the world. I didn't want to have to pick just one. I didn't want to have to decide that one need was more important than another, and thereby more in "need" of my help. I didn't want to choose wrong....and leave someone out in the cold.

But I think what God wanted was for me to get my duff out of my comfortable recliner and just do something. I have a friend who said to me some version of this: we have already been given the command to GO and to GIVE and to HELP those who are lost and hurting and in need. If we have the ability to do something, why would we need to pray about doing it?

No one can fix it all. But it's wrong to think that because we can't do it all - or can't even do a lot - that we should do nothing.

So guess what? I am doing something.

I have started - in very small, timid ways - responding to the situations I see around me. Not big things. Nothing I could write a book about. Or even an essay. Maybe just a sentence. But it's something. And I cannot begin to tell you how it feels. It is HUGE. My little tiny something is HUGE to me because it is my heart. And it's God's heart.

And I pray I will continue to do something for the "least of these" (Matt. 25:40) for the rest of my life.

Because you know what? I want to be Christ's hands and feet. I am the body of Christ, and I want to act like it. It is my deepest longing and desire to answer the call of Jesus and DO SOMETHING to serve and to minister and to help and to provide for those who are hurting and hungry and lonely and orphaned and in need. I want Him to be able to say to me, "Well done, good and faithful servant. Enter into the joy of your master." (Matt. 25:21)

The book? Tom Davis was right on. Right. On. Truly, I highly recommend reading it. But be careful....you will never be the same.

And Thankful Thursday?

I'm so THANKFUL to my God for continuing to shove nudge me out of my comfort zone and into a life that looks a tiny bit more like my Savior. Someday I may just live a faith that bleeds.

You are Cordially Invited....

To a Bloggy Baby Shower!!

For Bill and Lynsay *******

Don't know Bill and Lynsay? Me neither.

Now why would we want to go to a baby shower for someone we don't know? In real life that would be awkward. "Hello, I know you don't know me, but a friend of a friend that I met on the internet told me you were having a baby shower, and...well...I wanted to give you a gift." Yeah. Awkward.

But in this case it's not awkward at all. My bloggy friend Linny at A Place Called Simplicity is co-hosting a baby shower for her friends Bill and Lynsay.....who, by the way, are not having a baby.

Ok, so let me get this straight. We are being invited to a bloggy baby shower for people we don't know, who are not having a baby?

Yes. :)

Let me explain.

Bill and Lynsay live and work with special needs orphans in Ch*na. They have recently opened Morning Star Family Home, a f0ster home where they are currently caring for 5 of these sweet babies, providing love, food, nurturing, and medical care for them. Last December, they began renovating MSFH in order to provide more space, where they will be able to care for up to 25 babies at a time.

And so the baby shower is a way we can shower them with blessings, providing the things they will need to care for and give a home to all of these precious little ones.

Current estimations say there are 147 million orphans in the world. 147,000,000. That is such an enormous, overwhelming number that we can often feel helpless to do anything. It may seem like any small effort we could give would never be enough to make a difference.

Have you heard the story about the starfish?

The Starfish Story
Loren Eiseley, while writing his book The Unexpected Universe, was walking along the ocean in Costabel early one morning. It was shortly after a storm had subsided and as he continued walking, he noticed that thousands of starfish had been washed up on the beach. Ahead of him was a gigantic rainbow of incredible perfection shimmering into existence. At the base of the rainbow stooped a little boy, gazing fixedly at an object in the sand. Eventually, he flung the object far beyond the breaking surf.

Eiseley went up to him and asked, "Son, what are you doing?" The little boy answered, "I'm throwing starfish back into the sea because if I don't they're going to die."

"But there are thousands of starfish. In the larger scheme of things you're not going to make much of a difference to all these starfish."

The little boy looked up at him, stooped down again to pick up another starfish and, gently but quickly, flung it back into the ocean. "It's going to make a big difference to that one," he replied.

Eiseley was embarrassed, uncomfortable with the contrast of the little boy's youthful, innocent love for the living with his own hardened, "mature" indifference to death. He had nothing to say and left, continuing to walk on the beach but unable to get the picture of the little boy out of his mind. It was a moment of truth for Eiseley, of deep soul searching and self-confrontation.

In time, he returned to the star thrower, silently picked up a starfish and spun it far out into the waves. "I understand." he said quietly. "Call me another thrower." Together, still under the hues of the rainbow, they spent hours throwing starfish back into the ocean. It was a task not assumed lightly, for it was men as well as starfish they sought to save, sensing intuitively that man cannot exist spiritually without life.

I have so often felt like the one gift I could give...the small amount of money I could send...the one person I could help wouldn't really make that much of a difference in the world. But it makes a difference to that one.

Jesus said, "Whatever you did for one of the least of these, you did for Me."

Bill and Lynsay are making a difference....one baby at a time. And we have the opportunity to help them.

You can read more about their work by visiting the Morning Star Foundation website here, and why they do what they do here.

Visit Bill and Lynsay's blog here.

Read about the bloggy baby shower and how you can participate on Linny's blog, here (AND...she's having a give-away related to the shower! Don't you just love shower games?).

See the list of items they need here.

I sure hope you'll join us. You CAN make a difference in the life of a little one who needs love and care and the hope of Jesus. And....baby showers are so much fun!