Wisdom and Hope

Meet F, he is staying in M2.  F will be traveling to court on the 21st.  His charge is “Idle and Disorderly”, which is the charge given to ‘street kids’ being arrested for being on the street.  Many of the kids I interacted with were smart and bright and full of potential.  F has something that stood out to me, he is wise, “The mouth of the righteous utters wisdom...” Psalm 37:29.  

Several years ago, due to war, F, his mother and sisters left their village for the city.  While in the city F was fortunate enough to gain a sponsor for a boarding school.  F went to school and his mother and sisters returned to their village soon after.  Two years later while F was in Primary-5 he was told that the funds were no longer coming from his sponsor and was ‘chased away’.  With no money and no way to return to his village F found himself living in the streets, an offense for which he was arrested and taken to M2.  I spoke with F in all three visits to M2, his story is unfortunate, yet he doesn’t see it that way.  “I want to go to school near my village, so that if we are unable to pay I will not end up on the streets”, “this place is not so bad, it is better than the streets and I have learned a lot about being a different person, I try to tell the guys that they should turn from their ways, some will listen others will not, but all will have the same opportunities to change.” I was amazed and convicted by his attitude.  He was arrested due to his misfortune, yet he is counseling others to be better people.  He looks at his situation as a season during which he will learn whatever God has for him to learn.  Like Joseph, he trusts in God’s plan even while in prison.

I am not writing this for monetary support (although he would like to finish school), I am not writing this to shock you about just how serious the situation is (it is very shocking), I am asking you to fast and pray for this young man... Pray that there is enough gas to get him to court (nearly 60% of the time there isn’t enough), pray that his charges are dropped, pray that when he is released he has somewhere to go (the kids are often allowed to stay in M2 for a short period of time before they are taken to a place to stay or are released to the streets), pray that he gets into school near his village and becomes educated, pray that he return one day to M2 to be the inspiration that so many of these kids need... a story of hope and of God’s perfect plan.   

Still Processing

     If you're an apple user, you would appreciate the fact that every time I attempt to get my thoughts down I feel like I have that little wheel spinning that tells you "it's gonna be a while".  I had it all planned out before I left, I would journal the details and blog the experiences with the aid of the details to prevent my days from running together.  However, I haven't been able to sit down and get it out.  I think its because I may have to break the emotional dam in order to process.
     Several things have bothered me since my return:
1.  My ability to be 'out of site, out of mind'.
2.  The inability to answer the question 'How was you trip' within our American attention span limits (roughly 20 seconds).
3.  There are no roosters in my neighborhood
4.  Orange Fanta will never be the same
     There are so many things that I have taken with me, but I cannot shake the level of commitment which the Sixty Feet staff and supporting families (Moses and Betty, Fred, Ernest and Catherine, Boaz and Faith and many other) have for the Gospel.  In america they would have book deals and speaking engagements booked for a year solid.  Their hair would be trendy and their clothes would be the latest thing.  Christian radio and magazines would be featuring them and their stories on the front page and at rush hour.  I would be buying their book to find the '7 steps' to being like them.  I'm so glad that is not the case...it would make it cheap and familiar.  Instead, these folks serve... they serve Jesus with all of their mind, heart, soul, and RESOURCES.  They never seemed to flinch in the face of a need, they didn't take the time to 'pray' about what the scriptures command.  They take Jesus at his word every second of every day and rely on Him for their needs.
     When I was a kid I wanted to be like Fred McGriff, he was a First baseman in the major leagues.  He was left handed and so was I, he played first base and so did I, he had an open batting stance so I tried it.  As a somewhat grown man I have found that I still desire to imitate someone.  As hard as  I try to be my own person and to find my individuality I cannot escape the desire to have a good role model.  Christ is that perfect role model.  "Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ" 1Cor 11:1.  Christ has become my role model, and like Fred McGriff I also have connections with Christ:  he was tempted and I am tempted, he is the Son of God and I have become a son of God (through Adoption), and like the batting stance Christ loved all men, so i'm working on doing the same.  The Staff on the Ground in Uganda are the 'Paul's' of the above quoted verses.  If we strove to be like them, the result would look like Christ.
     I plan on recording my experiences day by day on this blog as a remembrance, however, there are faces, hearts, and experiences I cannot never forget.  They have been imprinted upon the fabric of who I am in Christ.  Those are the things I want to share the most, yes the smells were bad and the poverty was shocking.  Yes it seemed like God had walked away from these places...until you looked into the eyes of these children, heard their stories, saw the joy and hope in their hearts.  Until you watched men with families sacrifice their time and resources for the lost and broken.  Until you came face to face with Jesus in the midst of it all.
     Like many others, it is my hope that every able and willing body join Sixty Feet and Visiting Orphans on at least one journey...  

Last Friday Night... are you serious???

I'm sure that I am one of very few Americans who have never heard "Last Friday Night" by Katy Perry.  At least I was one of very few Americans until yesterday when while sitting in traffic I allowed my radio to stay on while finding what I wanted to listen to on my phone.  WT_????  Are we serious??  This nation is decaying daily and we spend so much time blaming the left, the right, the carbon deposits, the rich, the list goes on.  There is a reason that songs like these are popular, the masses (the mob) want it.  They buy it download it, stream it on their social media sites.  They try to imitate through their dress and attitude.  'They' is a dangerous word to use.  I have been in 'they' before, thankfully not on this song. I think this is a litmus test of our nations (general public) concern over what matters. I'm venting.... sorry, I had to get it off my chest.

Going

Uganda...

I have the privilege of joining Sixty Feet and a group of others on a trip to Uganda. This will be my first time out of the country and my first 'mission trip'. I am both excited and intimidated. I praise God for the answered prayers that got me here. I thank him for his grace and mercy, and pray that my eyes open and rather than being a deer in head lights I hope to move. I have been complacent, which has lead to an uneasiness in my spirit. Help me to prepare my mind and thoughts.

I have fought my wife's apparent addiction to blogs, however after reading several Uganda related blogs for the past few nights I have shed tears and lifted praises and prayers. I have been encouraged and challenged.

The blog is titled GO because that is our command, at least that is the way I read it....

A Place of Retirement

When I think of "a place of retirement" my mind automatically drifts to a house on the beach or something dreamy like that. However the phrase is actually a definition for the word 'closet'. Jesus while warning his disciples not to pray as the hypocrites, tells them hat when they pray they should "enter into thy closet...shut thy door". This has not been very easy for me being that I tend to be a bit of a literalist. I have attempted to go into my closet, however I have always lived in apartments or smaller quarters where even in the closet I can be heard, the distractions are always a wall away. I know realize that Christ's words and example intend for us to find a place of retirement (a place of privacy or seclusion). Even still I find this hard, every where I go I am distracted. I need to find a 'place of retirement'.

Social Networking

I guess you could say that "Social Networking" is a loosely used term. It could refer to the act of meeting people or Facebooking. I will speak to the new generation of social networking, the MySpace, Twiter, Linkedin, etc. I have been attempting to use these 'tools' for over a half decade (Ithink the first one was Xanga...what ever happened to that?), this blog is my latest of three attempts at blogging. There are many reasons why this has never worked for me: time, patience, and writer's block. Technically one would have to be considered a writer before he could have writers block... oh well. I always feel like if it is going to be free for others to view then it needs to be profound. Once I write what I think is profound and read it over it wounds like the whining of a middle class confused American. My wife on the other hand is a natural, she is so at home with her social networks that she could care less if any of her words are spelled correctly. To me that is like walking outside in my underwear??? I'm weird I guess, i'm one of the few in the US who does not have a FaceBook, never had a myspace and has tweeted less than a dozen times.

Someone I know "tweeted" the following words 1hour ago "Always be defined by what you are, not what you are against" -Miles

I'm not so sure that I follow this as closely as I should, I am pretty vocal about what I am against and probably no more facts about what I am against than what I am... i'll have to continue to consider this.

Perspectives 1

b : the capacity to view things in their true relations or relative importance

It has become painfully clear that my 'perspective' does not have enough room for... anything but myself. I mean I think about my family and talk with others. I go to work and read books, but I do not internalize the things that are going on around me near or far. When I speak to others it is difficult for me to talk from any other level than my own. I find that this is cause for many selfish and idiotic comments, the kind that immediately leave me thinking..."did I really just say that???".

So, how does a persons perspective change? If simply watching the news or reading the paper were enough we would live in such a selfish world. It has to be something deeper, something that happens from within. I'm positive that as a 'Christian' or a follower of Jesus Christ I should know the answer, however I do not. Quite frankly I do not think that I can justify calling myself a 'follower of Jesus Christ', for my actions would say that I'm a follower of the millions of other 27 yr old married family men. Ok, that is a completely different topic. My immediate reaction to life is almost always one that is rooted in self... so how does this change? I think we have all head the stories or seen the commercials that depict what is going on in the lives of the people that we all commonly pass of as rude or selfish; the guy who cuts you off in traffic... you assume that he is a rude jack ass and probably flip him the bird (or at least think about doing it)... in reality is late for his 9yr old son first round of Chemo, and the many other examples of the plight of the lives that are around us daily. There is a song that plays on Christian radio stations, I think it is by Toby Mac..."give me your eyes for just one minute, give me your eyes so I can see, everything that I've been missing, give me your love for hummanity." I often think that it would be so much easier if there weren't so much 'cover-up' in this world, if everything weren't veiled. What would i do differently if I could see past the veil of peoples lives? At this point I don't know that I would notice because my head is looking down, not out. I am too concerned with my next paycheck to care about the guys who haven't had one for weeks. I justify this to myself by thinking "what can I do about it?"

Today my wife and I brought our daughter into Charleston to sight see. We visited Rainbow Row and the Waterfront park, we also visited the City Market where all of the merchants will sell you anything for less than the sticker says. There were t-shirts on a table for $10 that supported Haiti, I asked the guy about them and he told me that all he had was xl and xxl, so I didn't buy one. I have not read a single article or sent a single dime to help Haiti and I didn't buy the shirt because they didn't have my size!