I’m Going Bald…

So this is it! I am going bald…

Our church recently hired Kim Hammond to help direct local missions. He has a super fancy title “Director of Missional Imagination” (yes, it’s for real). He brought his family all the way from Australia to come help us.

Not a month after their arrival, Carter (7), was diagnosed with A.L.L. a form of Leukemia. (http://tinyurl.com/ykahbht) They have insurance, but there are always unexpected costs, co-pays, deductibles, etc… (Mom can’t work as she needs to be home to care for Carter, gas to and from chemo treatments, food on long days out – if you have ever had a serious illness, you know what I am talking about)

My goal is to raise $5000 in support of Carter’s treatment related expenses.

I figure there are lots of people who would love to help and lots of people who would love to actually SEE me shave my head – which I am excited to do!

200 people at $25 each is all it takes! Go to My Info or Boxes tab to donate!

Highest donors get to take a swipe at my head with the clippers too! Fun for all!

I would love to see you at my Head Shaving Party on Feb 21st in Yorkville! RSVP on the events page if you are coming!

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Im-Going-Bald

Go to My Info or Boxes tab to donate!  (I am trying to get a donate button for my blog for those of you not yet in the facebook world…)

changing the world

…or not. I just read a great post, not really about changing the world – but it was mentioned as a side note.  You can read the post here.  It’s about the “Organic” Church and whether or not it will ‘last’.  Now obviously, nothing lasts.  Ways of doing things – even church – come and go.  They change out of necessity as people, their needs and their cultures change.

What I really liked about this post is that it echoed something I have been saying to my friends for a while:

“Salt and light—that’s about the extent of our effectiveness. Nothing about transforming the world through our efforts. Make no mistake: Jesus does indeed call us into the world to do stuff: preach, baptize, teach, and heal. But he does not promise results.”

When people preach about prosperity, or God ‘blessing’ something.  It presupposes that if things that do not succeed in ways WE think are appropriate or expected, well, that God is not ‘blessing’ it.  Or somehow we have missed the mark.  Isn’t that what people thought about Jesus ministry when he died on the cross?

My friend Sher twitters alot about obedience.  It’s funny, I call it doing what God says (the “O” word seems so…big) But I think she gets it.  We want good results, we want to change our worlds for the better, because of the God we know.  But it is really none of our business what the results are.  Our business is to do what we are told.  Faithfully, cheerfully (with excitement at the opportunity).

As I make desicions about my life, I try to be “smart” about things like my ‘future’ – although it seems like a dubious thing to be smart about.  The Bible says to count the cost of building before you start to build so that you can finish it.  It doesn’t say to not build it.  I would think, you would modify your blueprints based on your resources, but still build.

So, that’s what I am doing.  Building. It may change the world around me… or not.

I used to be…

…a “normal” woman.

As I sit at my kitchen table working from my home, I look out my window.  The lady next door is home and a friend has come to visit her, bringing something with her. (I am not THAT nosy or curious as to get up to verify what she was bringing)

My mind wanders back to the days when my children were little and I was home during the day.  Of course, I had two jobs then (and some hobbies)!  Day care during the day and various jobs during the evenings.  But the pace was so much different.  The stress was more immediate, more fixable. Send a kid to ‘time out’, feed them, put them down for a nap… you know.  Of course, illnesses are another thing, but in general it was all good.  Peaceful even amidst the chaos.

I am a different kind of  “normal” woman today. I still have 2 jobs (and some hobbies)! A matter of passion more than necessity. My life now consists of big deadlines and adults with long term issues, struggles and stresses.  You can’t just tell them to take a nap, or put them in ‘time out’.  There seems to be more at stake.  There was certainly a LOT at stake – raising kids- forming who they will be and what they will effect the rest of their lives.  I was aware, but yet blissfully ignorant of the real gravity of that job.

Then there is the lack of community. Time to just hang out with people you like, that have the same interests and life situations, or different ones…either way.

So, as I watch the neighbor’s friend (who looks like a hobbit, btw) go back and forth to her car, I miss those days.

And so ends my lunch break… deadlines, problems – that we now call ‘opportunities’ -await…you know.

New hope

I started out doing what I don’t like… working out alone. It wasn’t bad. But as I left the gym I was struck with an overwhelming sense of hope.

Nothing special happened – except that sense of new hope.

There was nothing wrong with the “old hope” … I didn’t think I needed refreshing. But miraculously, I was refreshed. Like a fresh breeze blowing in a bout of good weather.

The rest of the day was good news, a chance meeting with a friend, another friend came to help me organize my home office, more good news…

ahhhh.

I am full of gratitude and wonder…

Change. Comfort.

It’s how I started blogging.  “beth, please change” was my first blog title.  It was really Bret leaving me a message to change the title of the blog he set up for me.  But I liked it.  It seemed to me the very words I hear God telling me.  Change.

So rather than change the title, I left it.  So I could remember how important it was to keep growing and changing.

Romans 12:2- Don’t be conformed to the world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

Changing a mind is a hard thing to do.

We are so afraid of change and the unknown.  So afraid, in fact, that we fail to even make effort to implement changes we really want to make, much less uncomfortable ones!

Which leads me to…

Comfort. Why are we (I) always looking for comfortable settings? Comfort is anti-adventure.  Jesus was pretty clear about comfort.  He didn’t have it, or look for it.  I don’t think you can change the world (for the better, of course) from your lazyboy or comfy couch. Well, I don’t know that I can do that.  (I suppose there may be some writers that are capable – but still they have to be out and about to gain the experience they write about. So I will stick with my lazyboy assumption.)

I want to change the world.  The world around me anyway…

So, I guess it’s change, adventure and anti-comfort.

Half of doing…

This is my trainer…

His name is Nate.

I fight with him a lot.

Now… you may be thinking with disgust,  “How COULD he??”  But I am not talking about THAT kind of fighting, because as you can see by the picture to the left…I would not only lose – but would probably die doing it!

This is what we fight about:

The picture is of Nate and Tasha (his fiance)’s gift to me this Christmas. No, we don’t fight about gifts.

We do argue about belief.

Nate is trying to convince me that you have to believe it to be able to do it. But just look at him… what CAN’T he do? Of course he believes it.

So, I get irritated.  I know many people who have believed they could do things, only to find out they couldn’t.  And I am REGULARLY surprised at the things I can do, that I wasn’t really sure I could.  Fortunately, I have a healthy curiosity and a strong drive to TRY to get what I want. That keeps me going.

But after receiving this gift I was resolved to figure this out…. Here is what I came up with.

When I go in to train, Nate says, “OK today is ‘Hundreds Day’. We are going to do 100 reps of each exercise.” And I think, “Who is WE?”   Then I think, “Well, we’ll see”  (not in a cynical way, but in a ‘I sure am curious to see if he knows what he is talking about” sort of way. I mean, HE thinks I can do this humongous feat… So I start counting.)

I don’t start believing in my abdominal strength or my resolve to finish, though.  I just believe HIM. And so I try. At 88 I start thinking… “wow” (and ouch).  At 99 I think, “Huh.  What do you know…”

Sometimes I can’t finish.  Pain or complete fatigue keeps me from it, no matter how mad or resolved I am.  It just isn’t there.  I hate that.  But he is happy – like he planned it that way…then he tells me that working to failure helps build those muscles.  (NOTE: I am not a body builder, but started with little to NO strength from decades of lack of use)

So what does this all mean to the “1/2 of Doing is Believing” statement?

For me, it means that by myself I am nothing.  I may think / believe I can or can’t do something.  But Christ, who made me, knows infinitely better than I what I am capable of.  “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me”  is a faith / belief statement.  But not belief in ME – it is belief in Christ… In His understanding of my abilities and in His faithfulness to me when I fail…and so I dare to try.

It’s the same when I am working out.  I don’t know HOW to believe I can.  So I just believe what someone, who knows better, says I can.  He is always right too.

….yup.

Falling Down

It happens.

Get up.

Connectedness

You can’t escape it.  You are connected.  Everything about you in this world is about your relationship to it.  Relate poorly (denying the connections) and there is a sense of disconnect or brokenness, maybe lonliness.  Relate well and things feel fine.

Note:  I didn’t say you ARE disconnected or that they ARE fine.  The feelings are just on top…indicators of how we are living in this connectedness.

So..nothing profound here.  I just think we need to be reminded that we are not, have never been islands.  We are not, have never been “self-sufficient”.  We have always been in community, always dependent on others, always fed by and feeding our relationships.

Don’t deny it.  Swim. Nurture your relationships.  Engage the world around you. Live.

Something fun and pretty to think about

…I want something fun and pretty to think about. Not like princess dresses or new hairstyles – just things that are interesting, new…out of the ordinary.

Ideas, new plans, new towns, challenges…fun ones… the kind you really think you can accomplish, but know that it will require some brain exercise.

I think the Bible talks a little about this as “tickling the ears”. Stuff we use to keep ourselves distracted or feeling smart or important.

Not all new / creative ideas fall into this category, but when my brain starts wandering – looking for the fun and pretty – I know it is time to reign it in and get down to real work. The tedious, sometimes mundane work of today.

Exciting projects will have to wait. New directions, new ideas…visit me later. I am busy with today.

small things…great love

We cannot do great things on this Earth, only small things with great love. – Mother Teresa

I do it.  I get caught up in the ridiculousness of BIG.  Go big or go home. The bigger the better.  A big deal. blah blah blah. It’s almost like if it ISN’T big it isn’t worth anything.  Wow. What a lie.

When I came across this quote again today I cried as God reminded me of all the little (potentially inconsequential) things I have been doing.  Not “doing little things and doing them with great love” – but doing little things because of great love.  Little things that don’t feel like much, maybe, but because of the intensity of the love that Christ has put in my heart I do them because I have to do something and that is all there is to do.

What are those things? Grocery shopping for a sick mom, seeing the best in someone everyday, sharing hope, saying the good you see, giving the little you have in your hand, spending time with someone doing nothing…or something important – doesn’t matter, showing up day after day, being you- fully, living transparently – even when it hurts, fighting thru  – no matter what, teaching skills you have that others don’t, not teaching when you could so others can grow, sharing tools, sharing ideas…

My guess is that you have a lot of things to put on that list…

At the same time I am convicted by the many little things I don’t do, important things, I neglect just the same.

Today, for now,  I focus on the good.