Serving in the city

On Sunday, Jason, Aidan & I and about 150 buddies from our church spent the afternoon volunteering here in the city. Last year we stocked food at a food pantry and cleaned up an older church.

This year our small group chose to work cleaning up the yards at two safe houses.

After a few hours of gutter cleaning, raking and bagging we had cleaned up the yards with over 50 huge leaf bags!

The director of the safe house program said as soon as we get finished (we also had a crew inside repainting) that they were moving a family into these homes.

Last year, I equated volunteering as that ripple effect you see when you throw a pebble into water.

Even though we may never see the ripples our pebble of service will have on this family or the families to come, the fun, fellowship and life changing effects that volunteerism has on our hearts keeps us serving.

Where have you served lately?

What to do with leftovers?

Thanksgiving was a nice day for us to have a little quality family time and a lot of turkey. I bought way too big a bird.

Aidan asked what are we going to do with all the leftovers.

I told him we could give it to the homeless. A great idea but I wasn't really expecting to jump up and go deliver meals to people on Thanksgiving. Oh my selfish heart.

Aidan jumped at this idea and wanted to make plates right after dinner.

So after Alayna's nap we heaped up a few plates, loaded the kids in the car and headed downtown to find someone who was in need of a meal.

Aidan was worried that we wouldn't find anyone today that needed a meal (Ugh, son there are people everyday that need a meal).

It didn't take us but a few minutes to find a man standing on the corner carrying all his possessions on his back. We pulled up and Jason asked the man if he would like a meal. The man immediately replied, "Yes please". When Jason handed him the meal the man then said, "May God bless you all". Those words are etched in my memory with a picture of this man's face.

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? The King will reply, Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me. Matthew 25: 37-40.

Here was a man who didn't have a place to call his own, didn't have a meal to eat on Thanksgiving, and was carrying all his possessions in a small bag on his back wishing us God's blessings.

I don't know why this man is homeless and probably will never know. I do know that a lump stayed in my throat for quite a while as I thanked God for my family, for our abundance, for this sweet man who granted us blessings and for seeing the face of Jesus today as we threw another pebble into the water.

In reflection last night, Aidan shared how wonderful it felt to serve someone else. We prayed for those men who we fed and discussed what else we can do to continue to make tiny ripples of change in our world.

Thank you God for changing all our lives with your love.

Happy Thanksgiving...

Sunday reflections

We went to the new parent breakfast at the DSG yesterday morning. Aidan wanted a picture of his classroom pet, Willie, which he was drawn to take care of this weekend (thankfully he is a stuffed tiger) with Alayna & LC. Aidan has to keep a journal of his adventures with Willie to take back to school on Monday. Each student in the class gets to keep him for a weekend, and all the kids love it. I am very thankful his kindergarten teacher didn't send home their corn snake last year!


Then within 2 hours of getting home Aidan complained of a sore throat and had a fever of 102. Neither of the kids get sick hardly ever so when they complain you know they are sick... Yep, sure enough he has strep throat.
Ugh, hope we didn't pass it on to any of our friends at the breakfast...especially his 2nd sister LC ! I have already warned Courtney to dunk LC in sanitizer. AHH!

Jason took Aidan to after care and got him started on antibiotics while Alayna and I visited with my college buddy, Jan. She just returned from a mission trip to Tajikistan, where she was able to use her medical background (she is a PT not a full time missionary) and deep love for Christ to serve a population that had never been introduced to Christianity. She had some awesome pictures and stories to tell us of how one man is quietly serving the people there and through his service many people are coming to Christ.

She also showed us pictures and told us stories of the people in the leper colonies...I didn't even know there were still leper colonies in the world. I know we are blessed by the lives we have but it brings us so far back into reality when we not only hear but also, do something about others in the world who aren't as fortunate as us.

We threw another pebble when we financially supported (it wasn't a big amount trust me it was a SMALL pebble) Jan so that she was able to listen and follow God's call and bring His message to others. Listening to her talk I envisioned those awesome ripples on the still water... how many lives were changed by her visit? And how when we throw those tiny pebbles no matter how small, our reflection disappears, as it should be, our focus is not on ourselves but rather on Christ and how we can get others to meet Him. God truly is amazing by leading us to these small pebbles in our lives.

We are also thankful that God gave us this opportunity to experience a little more of his love. We are also thankful that Aidan is fever free and feeling much better. He is excited that he can go back to school tomorrow.

Keep throwing those pebbles, no matter what their size it definitely starts movement. Please let us know what ripples you have seen in your water.