Being Boaz

I started reading through the New Testament last November/December.  I didn't have a goal for each day just time in the Word.  I could stop as many times as needed or reread a chapter if I felt like I needed to.  Instead of a Bible study which is topic based (not knocking those, I am a big fan) I felt like I needed to take the verses in groups.  I needed to read what Jesus said all together; to not just enjoy one verse but to see what led up to it and what came after it.  This was very eye opening and a huge builder of my faith.  Once I read all the way through I thought I would go to another part of the scriptures (Psalms, Genesis) but it didn't feel right, so here I am reading through the New Testament again.  I am craving the Words of Jesus.

This morning I began with Matthew 1 and as I was drawn to the fact that Boaz's mother was Rahab.  First, I love that she is included in the lineage of Jesus.  He didn't come from perfect people or the queen of the land.  He came through incredibly imperfect people who choose Him over everything else.  I also thought about what that must have been like for Boaz.  I am not going to pretend that because this happened hundreds of years ago that kids were any different.  I am sure that Boaz dealt with his fair share of meanness from other children that knew his mother's lifestyle before the fall of Jericho.  I am sure that just like it would be today, Boaz's elementary and middle school years could have had some bullying in them.  

"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction so that we will be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God." 2 Corinthians 1:3-4

See, Boaz always seemed like a Superman character to me, this grand man on his horse riding in to save the beautiful and desperate Ruth.  Now in my mind I see a man that knows what it means to belong somewhere but not feel like he belongs, to know the cruelty of people and the sting of rejection.  I see a man that rose above his possibly troubled youth to become a hard working, wealthy field owner.  This is the man that I see extend grace to Ruth.  The one to make sure that his workers watched over her and took care of her.  I wonder if he saw a younger version of his mother in her, a young woman doing all she could to provide for her family (in this case Naomi, her mother-in-law)?  I see him doing what 2 Corinthians 1:3-4 says, reaching out in the comfort that he has received to comfort another in their affliction.

I love that the verse says that we can use the comfort that we received from God in our personal affliction to comfort others in any affliction.  Maybe the thing that we are experiencing right now is going to be useful not only in our lives but in the lives of others that will need comfort.  

This week I am going to think about how I can be a Boaz to someone.    

Well, time for work.  Thanks for joining me for my Monday morning thoughts.  I hope you have a wonderful day!  

The Weight of the World on my Finger

I need to talk about something.  I have to tell you I am struggling.

It all started about 7 months ago.  I came across a website that pretty much changed my life. If you have been on my blog before you have heard me share about it.  It challenged me to live for others instead of myself (something God had already been doing in my heart) and gave a radically practical way to do so.

I could donate my engagement ring and use it to drill a well for a village who doesn't have clean water.

I was ready.  I jumped in with both feet only to realize that, on this particular situation, I couldn't jump alone.  This jump required my partner, my husband, to be in the exact same place.

And we are rarely in the exact same place at the same time.

We are both busy and although we usually have dinner as a family we are so busy catching up on our work days and the Bugs latest activities that we do not have a chance to have the deep spiritual conversations.  Plus, God speaks to us in completely different ways and sometimes even the follow up actions from those God conversations look vastly different.  So, when I realized that I needed to speak with the Hubs about donating my ring I was immediately nervous.

Instead of waiting, praying and seeking God about how to approach him, I sat down and just blurted out what God was doing in me about radically giving.  The issue is that in the midst of my verbal vomit the heart behind my "why" got lost.  Oh, I have such regret over how I approached him.  It should have come as no surprise to me that the Hubs not only didn't get what I was talking about (seriously, I did a really bad job of explaining it) but I did such a terrible job that I actually made him feel like my ring was of no significance to me.

That couldn't be farther from the truth.

I absolutely love my engagement ring.  It tells the whole world that I am loved.  It is a beautiful ring and knowing that my sweet husband saved and worked hard to buy it and then that he went and picked out the stone and setting all by himself makes me feel like a queen.

It wasn't because I don't care about my ring that I wanted to give it, it is because I love it dearly that I wanted to give it.

The "why" of giving my ring goes back to Matthew 25:31-46 (that when the least are thirsty, it's really Jesus), Matt 19:16-22 (the rich young ruler, hung up on his stuff) and Matt 13:44 (the man that sold everything to buy the field with the treasure hidden in it).   It is a sacrifice that I can make and one that I feel I am called to make to my sweet Jesus who sacrificed everything for me.  Because Jesus is the one that is thirsty and I want to give Him water with my best.  It is because there are entire people groups in the world that are dying and going to Hell without knowledge of Jesus and when a well is built in their village it is an immediate, tangible way of showing them that they are loved.

I have heard from family and friends that what I want to do is crazy.  They get disturbed at the thought of me giving up such a precious item.  Heck, I even think that is valid.  It is disturbing to give up such a precious gift but do you know what is more disturbing?  The mother holding her child as he cries because he has contaminated water in his stomach or worse, the mother that just lost her child because of the lack of clean drinking water.  In light of those things, how can I not give it?

When I look at my finger, with the beautiful sparkling diamond on it, I no longer see the gift from my husband but instead I see faces of thirsty children, mothers without hope and fathers that cannot provide for their families.  I see half a village worth of people around the stone because that is what my ring could provide, about half a village worth of water and the eternally life saving knowledge that Jesus loves them.

So maybe I was being dramatic when I said that I had the weight of the world on my finger, maybe instead it is more like the weight of 125 lives.  As I look at the poverty and pain in this world I think about something that Francis Chan said once.  He said that people so often say that when they get to heaven they have questions for God about why He allowed such suffering and ugliness on this Earth.  Francis goes on to say that he thinks that in those moments that God will probably ask back why we let the poverty and pain happen.  That God left us on the Earth for a purpose and, at least for many of us in the US, we had the means and the ability to address it.  Why did we allow the suffering and not step in?  Why did we allow people to go hungry and thirsty and not step in?  Why did we allow the girls and boys to be trafficked and sold into slavery and not step in?

I am tired of not stepping in. 

I don't want to look back at my life and my possessions and wish I had made another choice.  My ring has signified many things over the years, first how much I was loved and the thoughtfulness of my husband, then when I couldn't give it, seeing the ring reminded me to live each day to the fullest in order to be able to reach out with God's love to the most people, but now, when I see it I mourn the lives it could have touched.

All I can do in this moment is respect my husband's current wishes and still act faithfully on the things that I have control over.  I look forward with great anticipation to the day we can give this together and I look back and see how God used these days and this struggle to bind us closer in the process.  I encourage you to listen and do the will of our Father.  He has the best gifts for us, even if it looks like giving away our finest Earthly possessions sometime.  His faithfulness is unfailing.

Thank you for listening.  Can I pray for you?  You can comment any requests to me and if you write "private" at the beginning I won't post to the website.

Mother's Day

This year Mother's Day has been a bit of a mixed bag.  I feel almost schizophrenic in my emotions.  On one side it is probably one of my favorite holidays.  Not because it is about "me" but because it is celebrating what my Bug and I have together.  I love being a Mommy, even when I am exhausted or frustrated or in an "over it" moment I still absolutely, without a doubt love being a mommy.  It is an honor and a privilege that I do not take lightly.

This year I have become more aware of how, for some people, Mother's Day can be a reminder of painful experiences.  For some precious women it is a reminder that they have a loved one that is no longer here.  For some beautiful women it is a reminder that the plans to have a baby did not follow the expected path.  Just yesterday I sat in a room with some wonderful people that are working towards adoption.  I don't know any of their stories but I wonder what today is like for them, not yet able to hold the child that has been birthed in their hearts already.  

Then I think about the moms of the 25,000 children that will die on Mother's Day from preventable diseases.  While I enjoy Mother's Day breakfast and the gift of a homemade card from my Bug another mother somewhere in the world will be mourning the loss of her child.  Many days it is thoughts like these that keep me awake at night.  

I can get so stuck in the mourning of these lives that it paralyzes me.  I wonder if you struggle with that too?  So, in light of all of this, what can we do?  How can we make Mother's Day and every day a day to help?  How can we, as Mothers and powerful Godly women, reach out to those without a voice?

We can make purposeful choices.

We make choices every day and we can tweak those choices so that they will impact the impoverished.  We can direct where our dollars go.  I am thankful that the more that I learn about the poverty and despair in this world that I also hear of more and more organizations that are ministering and going out to meet these needs.  

For example, do you like to shop?  Still haven't gotten a gift for your mom?  Does someone special have a birthday coming up?  Check out The Noonday Collection.  Instead of buying items from big companies that, at times actually increase the slavery of people through abusive working conditions, we can choose another path for our dollars.  The Noonday Collection items are made in poverty stricken areas and these purchases help provide a family a path out of poverty.  There is also the Mercy House in Kenya.  Purchasing these gifts directly impacts the mothers that live in this home.  (By the way, I am literally in love with the special Mother's Day offerings this year... if I was getting a gift this is what I would have asked for!)  I have only listed two of the many fair trade websites I have found that reach out to those in need and instead of just feeding them for a day they help them develop an ability to work and provide for their family.  It saves their lives and gives them dignity.  Talk about ministering to the widows and orphans (James 1:27).

Do you want to know more projects you can do with your family?  Are you interested in ways that you can educate your children on what is going on in the world?  Visit Live58.org.  This website is full of challenging information and dedicates one part to sharing what other families are doing together to educate and change the mindset of the next generation.  Watch their video too... powerful.

Are you ready to go deeper?  Want to live in a way that you are sacrificing some of your abundance so that others can live?  Check out TheYesClub.org.  The Yes Club is all about challenging us to give something up for a year (yes, a whole year) and give what we would have spent on that luxury towards clean water.  Let me tell you as I am nearing the end of my commitment to The Yes Club (I gave up gifts for a year and Mother's Day is the last holiday that I would have gotten a gift for in this year) I have realized that even though the money that would have been spent on me has gone towards giving life saving physical and spiritual water to those in need, the life that has been saved is truly, once again, mine.  God has not let one tiny piece of this lesson go to waste.  He is moving in mighty ways right now.  

Another ministry that is all about radical giving is With This Ring.  It began with the founder giving her wedding ring, a symbol of love, desire and belonging, so that mothers on the other side of the world would not be without clean water.  You can give sacrificially to this ministry a number of ways.  You can become a champion and give funds towards the clean water wells being drilled in India.  If you are thinking about getting engaged you can choose an engagement ring from the rings that have been donated.  You can even be a part of their Project Beloved and make your wedding about clean water for others.  To learn more about how you can be a part of sharing the life changing message of radical giving visit WithThisRing.org.

Today my church highlighted Compassion International.  This ministry is out there being the hands and feet of Jesus to these sponsored children.  If you don't sponsor a child you need to.  I love that my pastor mentioned how we will say that we need to pray about whether start a child sponsorship but asked how often we pray about whether or not we should go to the movies or out for dinner.  He said that we didn't need to pray about whether we need to sponsor a child, we just need to do it, because God has made it clear in His Word that the least of these are dear to His Heart (Matthew 25:31-46). 

I have already shed a number of tears today as I have enjoyed the highs of hugs from my Bug and time with family and the lows of thinking about the mothers that are weeping today because they do not have enough food or water to give their children. Yet I am glad that in the midst of this I can also think about the people that are out there, making a difference, reaching out with the love of God to those in the most desperate need and I will know that I will do my best to give and be a part of reaching out with them. 

So, will you join me?  Through the love of Christ, obedience to the scriptures and making different choices we can change the world.  Let's do it together and let's do it now. 

The End of the Dreaded Media Fast...

The end of this fast seems to be pretty successfully summed up in this one quote.

“One of the great uses of Twitter and Facebook will be to prove at the Last Day that prayerlessness was not from lack of time.” John Piper

Yep, how are your toes?  Mine are killing me.

Once again I have lived through a fast.  A giving up of something that seemed like a necessary part of my every day, and.I.lived.  Not only did I live, but with the exception of a few precious grandparents, I doubt very much that the world missed me.  I couldn't tweet about my experience in Walmart, I couldn't text my bestie about the ridiculously cute/annoying/funny/painful thing that the Bug did that day.  And we all lived.

I think that this month away from Media (TV, Facebook, Twitter, Fun Blogs, YouTube, Music, Pinterest, Texting) has taught me two things.  The first is it isn't the big things that steal your time.  I rarely sit down at the computer and open Facebook and spend 3 hours on it (I am not going to say it hasn't ever happened but it is a rare case) however it is the text that pops through with a funny story, or the message that dings telling me that someone liked/commented on one of my posts.  It is the fact that I want to stop and share whatever just happened to me with the world.  Those 20 seconds here, 1 minute there, 3 quick minutes all add up to a lot of distraction.  A LOT.  Then it takes my focus away, I have to get my mind back on track and happening that over and over again makes me feel like I can't think straight.  The multitasking is actually multi-distasking.  Making everything take longer and the result has a much lower quality.  I already have to work with a 3 year old hanging, climbing, jumping on me... as if I really need any other distractions.

The second thing that this month has taught me is how narcissistic I am.  Once again, just like my struggles with materialism, I wouldn't have thought I was narcissistic.  I tend to feel like I am a pretty giving person and I try to focus on others a lot but, when the rubber meets the road, I really think a lot of myself.  I want to share with others about me all day long.  I remember the first few days of the fast when I would think of something funny and then realize that I couldn't share it with the world and actually feel unhappy about it.  Really Amy?  There are MUCH bigger things to be thinking about.  I am so thankful for yet another mirror that has been held in front of me so that I could actually see the planks in my eyes (yes, there are more than a few!).

I think about how often I felt like there weren't enough hours in the day to accomplish time with God, cleaning my home, doing laundry, etc.  Yes, even on this fast I still had days where getting to everything was difficult but for the most part my home was cleaner, our clothes were put away and my time with the Lord was sweeter (probably due to the lack of distractions).

So, back to the quote at the beginning of the post.  I am pretty sure John Piper hit the nail on the head with this one.  It makes me sad that I look back over the years and see that I have wasted so much time on things that matter so very very little.  So, what is going to change?  I am so glad you asked.  First, I have a limit set on fun-web access during the work week.  If I have lived my day well, then at 9pm I can get onto my fun-web thing of choice.  If I haven't then I need to spend the time taking care of the thing that was missed and then I can get my fun-web time.  If it is the weekend I will have more flexibility.  I have also moved a treadmill into my bedroom (I know so romantic).  The idea is that if I am going to waste time watching television, because let's be honest, it is usually a waste, at least I can burn some calories and get in the workout that I "don't have time for".

More than anything I want to be purposeful to keep the main thing, the main thing.

I want to make sure my time with God has the highest priority in my day (by the way, ever since I did that I have had better, more fulfilling, longer days and a girlfriend of mine did the same thing with the same results).  The thing is it used to feel like work to read the Bible (I know, some people may be offended that I am saying that but the truth is the truth).  Now, I really look forward to it.  I have gotten so much out of reading through the New Testament that I am sad I am almost to the end but strangely excited that I can start it over and get even more reading it again.  More than anything I want to know that I am looking to God to fill my days and that I am not giving them away and wasting them.  The Bible says that we are but a vapor on this earth.  I want my short time here to matter.  I want to be used by God to the fullest.  I think about a story that Francis Chan shares about a special grandmother figure in the family.  The whole family goes to see a play and during intermission he leans over and asks the grandmother if she is enjoying the play.  She looks at him with concern in her face and says something to the effect that she wasn't sure that was where she would want Jesus to find her if He came back.  It is the idea that she would rather be focused on God, praying or doing work for Him than at that play.  What passion and clarity to live life by!  I find that I am thinking more and more about the day when I meet Him face to face and I give an account for my life.  Not my sins, those are completely covered by the blood of Christ and I know that I will be with God in eternity.  I am talking about the account of what I did with what He gave me.  There are a few years where I had the privilege to work in ministry and I feel like I spent those days well but when I look back over my life I see more waste than benefit.  That is not what I want my life to show.  When He comes back I want Him to find me busy at work for Him.  Please Jesus.

I am taking a few days before going into the next, final fast.  It will be a fast from Stress that will involve taking a Sabbath and purposefully pausing to pray throughout the day.  It will be interesting because it is less like giving up and more like adding in.  Thank you for taking this journey with me.  I still highly recommend the book Seven by Jen Hatmaker.  Even if you do not take on some of the fasts like I did, it will still have a profound impact on your life if you let it. 

Raising Up Foundations

In my last blog I talked about a website called Live58.org.  I found Live58 because they posted an article by the With This Ring founder, Ali Eastburn, on their website.  Here is the link to the post "With This Ring, I... Change the World" (it so clearly explains her heart and gives insight into the ministry... I love it!).

As I have learned more about how Live58 came into being it has brought me back to reading Isaiah 58 repeatedly.  I printed it out and taped it to my mirror in my bathroom so that I can see it multiple times a day.  Usually when I read something over and over different aspects and parts stand out to me at different times.  That is not the case (at least not yet) with Isaiah 58.  I continue to come back to one sentence and that sentence seems to be taking root in me.

"And your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt;
    you shall raise up the foundations of many generations;
you shall be called the repairer of the breach,
    the restorer of streets to dwell in."  Isaiah 58:12

It is almost strange to me that this is what continues to stand out.  I mean, the whole "share your bread with the hungry" part is pretty awesome but the idea of raising up the foundations of many generations is burrowing deep into my soul. 

I believe so strongly in the ministry of With This Ring that I am volunteering for it on a regular basis now.  What started as a few hours here and there has turned into a passion to serve Jesus through sharing about radical giving.  As I have dwelt on the idea of raising up the foundations of many generations I think about the villages that are receiving a water well through the radical gifts received by WTR.  I think about how it is changing the lives of those living in that village now but how it is also giving potential for the generations to come.  It has literally restored the streets of these villages that were destitute and without hope.  It provides for the widows who would walk miles in order to collect water (which was still usually teeming with parasites).  It provides hospitals with clean water for patients so that they do not leave the hospital more diseased than when they arrived (can you even fathom leaving a hospital more ill than when you arrived due to polluted water?!). I think about the children that will grow up hearing things like "Jesus loves us so much He sent these strangers to our village to bring us water" or "there are others who love Jesus and us more than their own comfort and gold and silver" and it makes my heart smile.  

Then the next layer peeled back and my understanding grew.

Raising up the foundations of many generations is as much (if not more) about those on this side of the equation as it is about those on the other side of the world.  Harriett Tubman said "I freed a thousand slaves but I could have freed a thousand more if only they knew they were slaves."  This is so true of many of us that live with the abundance of having our everyday needs met.  In many ways we are enslaved and we don't even know it.  We don't seem selfish or materialistic but somehow we find the money to go out to eat multiple times a week (guilty!) or buy new clothes even when we really don't need anything.  Meanwhile there are others dying without their basic needs of water, food, shelter and clothing being met.  I believe that by living out the idea of radical giving, sharing it with others and then watching those people share it with their children that we will truly raise up the foundations of many generations.  I pray that we can become a people that is so enamored with Jesus that the shiny things of this world no longer lure us away.  I pray that as we learn that Jesus is our prize and our treasure that our children will learn that there is nothing in this world that is worth more than following Him.  I pray that the generosity that He stirs in us will only be the beginning and that our children and our children's children will grow up learning and watching what it looks like to give with a grateful heart and then they will go forward and do even greater things.  

I truly pray that we can raise up the foundations of many generations (our own, our communities and those around the world) and restore the streets to dwell in. Please Jesus show us Your path to accomplishing these things for Your glory and Yours alone.

I love you Jesus.