About Time

OK, so we haven't blogged in like . . . forever.
SORRY!

I had a few moments tonight, so I thought I'd shoot a quick update for those of you who still check. =)

Yesterday, was a big day for feeling blessed.

We started the morning in chapel and one of our old co-workers Adele shared with everyone about the time she spent in Africa. WOW. What an eye opener.

I mean here's the thing, I've heard these talks before, I've seen pictures, and I know the facts. I am rich. Maybe I'm not rich, in the fact that I can't just go out and buy whatever I want. However, the fact that I can pretty much go out and just buy something to eat if I'm hungry, or the fact that I have an nice apartment to live in with running water, electricity, etc... or the fact that I can afford to fly home once a year. By the standards of a large majority of the world, I am rich.

Back to chapel, the stuff Adele shared really just broke my heart and amazed me. She shared with us about a family of four children whose father was a drunk and whose mother was no longer around. I forget whether she died, or she ran off, anyway, basically these kids were left to fend for themselves. When Adele found them, they were infested with jiggers, which are little flees that burrow into your skin and lay eggs. (She showed pictures, and yes it is gross.) Anyway, Adele basically loved on these kids. She helped to clean these flees out of the kids legs and feet. And she bought them new sheets and just basically took care of them. It really turned their life around. Now the dad has a steady job, is no longer a drunk. Adele shared that this dad shared with one of Adele's co-workers that "Adele helped her children to become human again." Amazing. God really used Adele to show his love to these kids.

Adele also shared other pictures of orphans that she worked with, and tribes who take care of cattle and just basically live outside with no running water, whose kids have the job of collecting the cow dung and piling it up to burn, so they can sleep in the ashes to keep bugs away. Seriously. Like I said, eye-opening.

I mean saying all of this, I may sound like an ignoramus, living up in my ivory tower. But like I said, I've heard the talks, and I've known about the suffering, but to look at pictures it brings things to light in a very different way.

Anyway, after having that chapel in the morning, I had another eye-opening experience in the evening when Linda and I and a few of our friends went to see "Slumdog Millionaire." Great movie by the way for those of you who haven't seen it. But be forewarned, there's lots of violence, so if you have a weak heart, maybe don't go see it. Anyway, again seeing the squalor and conditions that these kids grew up in. And just the danger they faced with the people who wanted to exploit them. I really just felt again very BLESSED.

All I have to say is, DADDY, THANK YOU! I know I did nothing to deserve the lot in life that you have placed me in. I know it is only by your grace and mercy that I have the things that I have, and I ask your forgiveness for complaining and being dissatisfied. And I ask your forgiveness for not taking advantage of all the things that you have given to me, and for even wasting many of the resources that you have so lavishly poured out into my life. I ask that you would help me to use every resource, every gift you give to me wisely. May I not squander any of it. And may I learn to be content and use what I have to bless others.