Be Careful What You Ask For

I was asked a couple of months ago to speak at a women's luncheon next Wednesday. The topic is "Laying Aside the Flesh and Running With The Spirit". I've had an idea of what direction I'm supposed to take it in, but honestly with all that's been going on in our family lately I haven't had much time until today to sit down and write it all out.

I've been particularly struggling with an intro. Not the most important part of a talk, I know, but you do want to have a good way to start off your journey with someone. So I have been wracking my brain for the past week or so trying to come up with a way to start this talk - some story about trying to run and being hindered or tripped up. I just kept praying and asking the Lord to help me out so I could get the creative juices flowing, but there was just nothing but a "wait and see, it will all come together" kind of feeling.

Then there was yesterday.

My husband and I decided we needed to put air in the tires on the van. We were down to our last 3 quarters in change in the car, and one air hose session cost $.75 (of course). So we were bent and determined to fill up all four tires without having to go get more change. Time to attack this thing NASCAR style, huh?

So the plan was that he would gage the tires, and I would fill them, then he would run around and recheck them and I would top them off. Sounded great, but running with a hose apparently isn't my forte. I'm sure you've guessed by now what happened - I totally tripped over the hose and crashed shoulder-first into a stucco wall. Yeah, are you laughing like my husband was? Mmm-hmm - it was hilarious - just keep on laughing.

It scraped up my whole left arm, bruised my shoulder blade, left my shoulder stiff and (I'm pretty sure) realigned some of the vertebrae in my upper back. Lovely. But at least I now have a story for my intro...

I'm going to go find an ice pack and call my chiropractor. You just keep laughing.

I'm Actually Looking For A Rut

Hello to all. Thanks for praying for my sister - she is at home and doing very well! God is truly amazing!

I wish I had something profound to write today, but I'm afraid I don't, really. Not that God hasn't been working in my life lately - it's just that I haven't had time to process it all and put it into words. In fact, He's shown me some pretty profound things over the past week or two, and I can't wait to figure out how to communicate them. For now, though, I think I feel a little like life is running over me like a steam roller. If this gives you any idea of what I mean - I went to bed last night at 8:40. By the way, 5:30 still comes early, regardless of when you fall asleep!

I guess there's just been a lot going on lately, you know? And the thing of it is, I'm a routine person. As bored as I can get with repetition, I absolutely have to have a routine. I kind of feel lost and unorganized without one, you know? I've been thinking since school started a couple of months ago that I would fall into one, but it just hasn't happened yet. I've tried and tried, but every time I think I find a routine that works for the week, something comes along to change it. I'm starting to wonder if God is trying to tell me something...

What about you? Are you a routine person? Or has God given you some great insight about why you shouldn't have a routine? I'm just curious this morning. Well, curious and wishing that I had some sort of plan for getting everything done this week that needs to get done.

Uh-oh - I think I hear that steamroller coming back for another pass...

Update And A Random Thought

Thank you for all your prayers and kind words over the past couple of days. I am happy to say that my sister's surgery went well and that she is out of a neck brace and was actually able to sit in a chair for a while today! She should be out of the ICU sometime today and out of the hospital all together by the end of the week if everything goes well.

Now for the random thought: on the way home from the hospital last night I saw a billboard that advertised that the lottery this time around is at something like $162 Million. I briefly thought about how funny it would be if someone climbed up there and wrote next to it "...or a tank of gas".

Keep praying, and thanks again!

Please Pray!

Plans are funny things, you know? They always seem so important until something entrirely unplanned comes along and totally takes over. Last night my sister planned on playing Bunco with our little group of Bunco Babes. She had been planning since Friday what she would bring for potluck snacks. But instead of rolling dice and eating the goodness that is the food other people cook, she was lying in ICU unable to move.

I was planning on posting today, but instead of posting today, I would like to ask you all to pray for my sister Kellee. She was in a car accident yesterday and is in the hospital with several broken bones and awaiting surgery on her back.

It goes without saying that I have no idea how regularly I will be able to post over the next couple of weeks as I step in and try to help where I can with her four boys. Thanks for understanding, and know that I will be back the second I can sneak in some time!

Oh how thankful I am today that God is bigger than our plans and the unplanned things that turn our lives upside down.

Nice Flarpet - Is That Berber?

So Big Brother got an award for being good during children's church a couple of Sundays ago. He was so excited to bring home a prize. His trophy? A can of Flarp - aka "fart putty". Now some of us moms will read that and go "how disgusting and inappropriate!" But I'm telling you from years and years of ministry with older boys, Flarp is the way to the male heart (and you always thought it was through his stomach!). Nothing breaks the ice faster and causes more laughs than being able to produce the sounds of bodily functions by simply inserting your finger in a can of goo (and nothing pleases the females in the room more than bodily noises that smell like blueberries instead of, well, you know....I always thought blueberry was a kind of interesting choice of fragrances though....).

Many, many laughs were had over the past couple of weeks in the Roberts household over this little can of Flarp. Until this past Sunday, that is. I'm not laughing so much right now....

Little Man thought it would be a good idea the other day to play with the Flarp outside of it's original, intended container. He also apparently thought it would be a good idea to see what happens when we put Flarp on the carpet - and leave it there. Oh yes, and I discovered all of this right before we were supposed to walk out the door for evening services. Perfect.

So it sat there all night (the residue, anyway - I picked up what I could). And then I forgot about it the next morning. Which meant that last night I was laying in the carpet wetting it down to try and saturate the now cement-like substance, and squeezing each individual fiber to get out what I could. I worked on it for about 45 minutes and did pretty well, but there's still a long way to go. Yeah, Flarp? Not so funny anymore.

We'll get it all out eventually (I hope). But you want to know the best part of it all? Until we figure out how to clean it all up, there will be a very noticible Carolina blue stain in the perfect shape of a Tar Heel footprint next to our dinner table. Guess which football team is my husband's least favorite?

Yeah, he's not laughing either.

Under the Bridge Downtown

Last Saturday Little Man and I went downtown to feed the ducks while Big Brother was at a birthday party and Daddy had company. We bought a loaf of bread for a dollar at the grocery outlet and drove to a part of the park we hadn’t been to before to see if we could find any willing diners. Boy, did we hit the jackpot! There must have been 80 or 90 ducks in that little area.

In no time the bread was gone and we found ourselves walking. And that’s when we saw him – the man I haven’t been able to get off my mind since.

When we first passed him, we were on the other side of the water from where he was sitting just watching the world go by. He might have looked a little down on his luck, but I just thought he was another tired guy taking a rest in the park. When we crossed over the river and came back on the other side, though, we saw the real story. That bridge he had been sitting under was his home.

Though the man himself was gone by the time we reached his spot, the evidence of a life worlds apart from our own remained. A pair of shoes, an old pair of thin pants, a garbage bag, a trash can… It wasn’t much to look at, but it was more than enough to open my eyes.

How many times have I driven over that bridge not knowing that he was there? How many times have people passed him while walking in the park without giving him a second glance? How often did he have to watch people like us feed a loaf of bread to a bunch of ducks while his own stomach went empty?

I thought about him all the rest of that day, and at some point a verse came to mind that has marked me deeply: “Whatever you did for the least of these, you did for me.” All at once that guy I just felt sorry for became someone different in my mind – he became a picture of my Jesus. And it’s a picture I can’t get out of my head.

My Jesus slept on a slab of concrete last night with a trash bag for a pillow.

Tonight my Jesus will be lulled to sleep by the sound of cars passing over his head.

Tomorrow my Jesus will wake to a foggy, chilly morning with nothing for warmth but a ragged, thin pair of cotton pants.

This week my Jesus will watch a bunch of ducks eat more than he might be offered in days.

Everyday my Jesus has to put up with stares of contempt from people who are inconvenienced and even repulsed by his presence in their otherwise tidy little worlds.

My Jesus is loved by his Father and deserves some help.

I know some might be thinking, “Yeah, and your ‘Jesus’ probably has a raging drinking problem or has done something to deserve being exactly where he is.” And maybe they’re right on some level, but what if they’re not? With the way the economy is going these days, can any of us guarantee that we aren’t going to fall on hard times at any minute? And even if they are right and he has made some big mistakes, isn’t that what makes him “the least of these”?

I’ve spoken with the outreach coordinator at our church, and we’re working on finding out what we might be able to do for this man. I wonder, though, how many others there are – even in our small town – who will have to go without food or shelter tonight. I bet it’s a lot more people than I would ever imagine. I’m thankful that Jesus sees every single one of them and knows their greatest needs by heart. I pray that He will help us see how to be a part of His solution in their lives.

If you want to listen to a great song that has made me do a lot of thinking lately, click here and watch a video someone put together for Brandon Heath’s “Give Me Your Eyes”.

I’m thankful today for this messy, chaotic old house that, despite all the frustration I feel because of it at times, I get to call “ours” for the time being. I really do have a lot to be thankful for!