The Beginning of a New Chapter

"Pure and undefiled religion before God is this:  to visit oprhans and widows in their trouble..."  James 1:27

I remember it like it was yesterday.  The day my husband had an intervention with me and told me the time had come for us to take down the baby bed.  We had three children all in a row over the course of 6 years, and during that time, we just consistently had a baby in a nursery.  How I loved those happy years!  The sweet baby sounds, the happy nursery smells of baby shampoos and lotions, the pitter patter of little feet in footy pajamas running across our hardwood floors.  I remember each of them sleeping so sweetly in that crib, the contented sighs of baby sleep.  I used to just stand there in the dark watching them breathe, loving them so much my heart hurt.  In so many ways, those were magical years in our home.

Then, one day, we turned around and our baby was three.  He was too big to fit in that baby bed anymore, and after a complicated third pregnancy, we knew we were done having children.  I was in major denial.  For me, taking that bed down was symbolic of a chapter closing, and it was such a happy chapter I didn't want it to end.  But, end it did, and the bed came down, life moved on, and now we are in another happy chapter of little league, school parties, sleepovers, and prime time kid years.  What a fun, busy, crazy chapter this one is, too!

This week, the Mission Athens team was blessed to meet to precious children, a very funny and friendly 7-year-old boy and a precious baby 1-year-old girl, who are going to have to live with their grandparents for a while.  Unfortunately, their parents are unable to care for them for the time being.  You can imagine that this situation is incredibly stressful for all involved.  The grandparents love these children, but they were not equipped with all the necessities it takes to care for a baby and her big brother.  A very special family at Central donated their son's baby bed to this family, and the Mission Athens team provided bedding, a few toys for the kids, food, diapers, wipes, and several items to help this family get started in this new chapter of their lives.

Also this week, members of the Mission Athens team had the opportunity to participate in the first Pack and Pray day for the Full Tummy Project group.  This is the group of moms here in town who provide food bags for kids in our elementary schools who may not have enough to eat on the weekends.  You can learn more about this organization by clicking on the link to their website here on our blog.  As part of that day, we were blessed to work together and take some of the donated items that would not work for the backpack program--large boxes of cereal, canned goods without pop tops, etc.  Our goal was to donate it to LCCI or get it to people who needed it.  Within just a few hours, we received phone calls about kids and their families who needed food to make it through the rest of the week.  In just one day, a member of our team was able to distribute this food to hungry kids and their families.  God is so good.

God saved the best blessing for last this week.  A member of our team was visiting her daughter in Hendersonville, TN.  Her daughter has a co-worker who was crying at her desk.  When her daughter asked her what was wrong, she discovered that this poor woman has 3 children and her husband had recently lost her job.  They were struggling to make ends meet, and she did not have enough food to feed her growing kids. 

Our Mission Athens teammate sent an email to us asking if we knew anyone in Hendersonville.  Guess who's sister lives right there and attends a church waiting to meet the needs of those hurting in her community??  That's right, the same big sister who taught me to read taught me another great lesson this week.  She dropped everything she was doing and went to visit and help out.  Now, this woman knows that there are Christians all over the place who are willing to help her.  Her immediate needs have been taken care of, and my sister's church has plans to help them through the holidays as well.

As we reflect on the week's work, we hope a new chapter is beginning in each of these precious lives.  We pray that the sweet kids who are living with their grandparents will know the love of Jesus as demonstrated by the strangers who brought them a baby bed, warm blankets, some toys and food.  We pray that the hungry souls who were nourished this week with food donations will learn that Jesus fills us up in ways that food cannot and that true manna comes from above.  And, finally, we pray that this special family in Tennessee whom we will never meet will feel the comfort of the prayers being offered up for them from the Mission Athens team, and that God will supply everything they need for the next chapter of their lives together.  God is good all the time, and all the time God is good.

Operation Page It Forward

"For this reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and with virtue, knowledge."  2 Peter 1:5

When I was 4 years old, my big sister was 8.  For the first few years of my life, she spent a lot of time asking my Mom and Dad if they could take me back where they had gotten me, and she tried to convince them that the family was fine with my older brother and her and no baby sisters were needed.  But, by the time I was 4 and she was 8, she had accepted that there were no return policies on baby sisters, and I was here to stay.  She took me under her wing at that point, and I have happily stayed there ever since.

Thank God for big sisters!  During that year, my sister found her calling as a teacher.  I used to sit in my window seat in my room watching for her to get home from school in the afternoons.  She would come straight in the house, up the stairs, and my "school" would begin.  We even had a real elementary school desk from a school my Daddy had gotten us somewhere--you remember the metal and wood kind with the desk attached to the little chair?  I would sit reverently as my hero wrote letters and words on our play chalkboard, and I always completed the homework assignments she gave me.  Very soon, my big sister had taught me to read.

My brother, sister and I were blessed to be raised in a family of educators.  Both our grandmothers, one grandfather, two aunts, and our mother were all school teachers, and our house was always full of books.  Our sweet grandmother helped each of her 7 grandchildren make it through countless research papers--this woman has a deep and abiding love for Shakespeare, and even at 84, she can still not only recite sonnets, but write them herself in perfect iambic pentameter.  We all wore out her dining room table, sitting patiently while Mammaw struggled to instill her passion in our thick heads.  A few years ago, she and her sister finally wrote a book of their own called "Memories," and the whole family enjoyed accompanying her with great pride to local book signings.

To this day when our family gets together at holidays, we spend the better part of our time together talking about books, swapping books with each other, arguing about authors, and making our "wish list" of the next books we want to read.  Whenever we call each other, we talk about the kids, the husbands, the jobs, and the usual, but we never get off the phone without the question, "What are you reading?"

I can't imagine how different my life would be without books.  From my earliest days, I have loved first listening to stories, then reading them, then writing some of my own for our school newspaper.  Reading is like milk and honey to my soul, and it continues to be a respite for me in the midst of our chaotic, hectic lives.  What could be more nourishing at the end of a long day after tucking in all the kids than to curl up in your PJs by a warm fire with a great book?  There have been many nights when I just couldn't put it down, and I would stay up late into the night turning the pages, eagerly anticipating where the story would take me next.

Even now, I could spend hours in a Barnes and Noble.  When I travel for business, I often spend my evenings in a bookstore.  I love to grab a Starbucks and....meander.  Slowly, slowly, I make my way through the store, soaking in all my options, making lists of all the books I can't wait to read next.  I even love the way the bookstore or the library smells, and no matter where in the world I may be, that smell feels like home to me.  I can't wait to hear the "crack" of the spine of that fresh hardcover book when you get it home and sit down to dive in.

Through the years, I have learned how to cook, how to write a proper thank-you note, how to survive pregnancy, how to raise a child, how to train a dog, how to end a friendship, how to fall in love, and even how to say goodbye to a lost loved one through the gift of books.  The gift of reading is the gift of life, and when you open up a book, you unlock the door to countless answers to a million questions, some of which you didn't even know you needed to ask.  The Bible encourages us to add knowledge to our virtue and our faith, and the path to knowledge is paved with books.

A few weeks ago, the Mission Athens team had the opportunity to tour the Downtown Rescue Mission in Huntsville, AL.  You can learn more about this amazing organization by visiting their website at http://downtownrescuemission.org.  The Downtown Rescue Mission is the area's largest homeless shelter, and they provide both drop-in services and long-term residential programs for North Alabama's homeless men, women, children and families.  They provide hot showers, warm beds, home cooked meals, and love for all the people in our area that have none.  It is truly an inspirational facility, and I am so thankful for the wonderful work they do. 

As we toured the Mission, we had the opportunity to meet some of the homeless residents.  Now, I am not sure what you think of when you think of a homeless person, but if you are like me, you picture someone who is uneducated who is wearing a heavy winter coat and may have a substance abuse problem.  Let me assure you, we have it all wrong.  There are people from all walks of life who for whatever reason, whatever series of horrific life events, bad choices and even worse luck, have ended up homeless.  We met a former New York model, a former mechanic, and we heard stories about former teachers and even physicians who have been helped by the Mission.  No one, and I mean no one, is immune from hardships in this world, and but for God's grace go I.  That tour was yet another moment, like so many others I have had as part of the Mission Athens team, when I had to stop that night and hit my knees thanking God for his abundant blessings in my life.

As part of our tour, we took a moment to stop in the Mission's library.  This library is a cavernous room, and a local team has painted wonderful murals and colorful illustrations all throughout the space.  Another local business has provided a bank of the latest and greatest computers.  There were even a great variety of toys in the children's section.  The only thing missing from this library is.....books!

They have a few shelves with a small selection of books, and one resident at the mission has even taken it upon herself to organize the meager titles using the Dewey Decimal System.  However, even despite the best efforts of the employees, residents and volunteers, I couldn't help but be saddened by the lack of books in the library.

A friend of mine and another member of the Mission Athens team had the opportunity to tour the Downtown Rescue Mission on a separate day when some of our team volunteered to serve a meal, and she left with this same sinking feeling.  A few days later, we were talking in the hallway of Central Church of Christ, and we both agreed we must do something!  "Operation Page It Forward," our holiday book drive, was born.

Now through the end of December, we will be accepting book donations for the Downtown Rescue Mission in Huntsville.  We will place a bin and poster in the hallway at Central, and we are asking all our friends to please donate gently used books of all kinds for the library.  Reference books, inspirational books, business books, children's books, travel books, cook books, Bible books, spiritual books, how-to books, self-help books, novels of all kinds, and even Shakespeare's sonnets are acceptable.  We want to give the gift of reading, to share the joy and inspiration that escaping in a good story can bring, to all who pass through the doors of the Downtown Rescue Mission library.

We know that our brothers and sisters at Central always respond abundantly to these calls, and we are asking you to do the same now.  We will happily fill as many trucks as it takes to fill up that library so that it will become the place it should be--a place overflowing with books!

I will certainly never be able to repay my big sister, my mother, my grandmothers or the countless teachers who have blessed me with a love of reading, but I can Page It Forward and hopefully make a difference in the lives of those who may stay up late into the night, turning those same pages of beloved books that have spoken to me through the years.  Won't you join me and Page It Forward, too?

Mission Athens: Extreme Home Makeover Edition Take 2

Full Tummy Project

"So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God."  1 Corinthians 10:31

A sad but true fact of life is that there are children all over the world who do not have enough to eat.  An even harder fact to swallow is that many of these kids live right here in Athens, AL, and are in class sitting right next to our kids.  As the economy continues to struggle, so do many parents struggle to make ends meet, pay the bills, and put food on the table.  Unfortunately, many cannot do so.

To that end, a new initiative has been started in Athens by a concerned Mom and her friends to help keep these kids' tummies full over the weekend.  Many kids benefit from a free breakfast and lunch at school during the week, but over the weekend, they do not have enough to eat.

The Mission Athens team is committed to helping spread the word about this wonderful initiative called, "The Full Tummy Project."  If you would like to help, you can click on the link to their website from right here on our blog at http://www.fulltummyproject.org/ for a full list of items that can be donated.

The Full Tummy Project team is working to create bags of food to send home in kids' backpacks on Friday afternoons.  They are collecting foods that do not require any preparation.  For example, ready to eat, easy to open items that require no cooking are perfect for these kids. 

For health and safety reasons, all items must be single serve/individually packaged items.  Items such as individual servings of healthy cereals, granola bars, peanut butter crackers, 100% juice boxes, Chef Boyardee pop-top meals, ready to eat soups (not condensed), spaghetti-os, applesauce cups, trail mix, etc. are all great donations.  For a complete list of items needed, please see the "shopping guidelines" section of their website.

Donations may be dropped off at Julian Newman Elementary School, Brookhill Elementary School, or Lindsay Lane Baptist Mothers' Morning Out Program.  As the temperatures drop and utility bills rise, tight family budgets get even tighter, and each week we are identifying even more children who can benefit from this program.  Thank you in advance for donating and helping keep kids' tummies full right here in Athens!

False Fairytales, Interrupted Lives, and Second Chances

"Then the word of God came to Jonah a second time."  Jonah 3:1

I was in kindergarten when Princess Diana and Prince Charles got married.  I remember waking up way before dawn to watch the royal wedding and being awestruck at the beauty of the young princess.  It is still a sweet memory when I think about how much I loved that wedding.  My Aunt Carolyn even got me Princess Diana and Prince Charles dolls that I still have somewhere at my Mom's house.

How I loved that fairytale wedding!  I used to take my Holly Hobby bedspread off my twin bed and my sister would take her matching yellow bedspread off her bed.  We would take the bedspreads downstairs where we had a long hall.  We would go out into the yard and pick bouquets of weeds.  Then, we would line our dolls up on the staircase as if they were sitting in pews watching the ceremony, and we would take turns tying our bedspreads on our heads to make veils with long trains, holding our bouquets as we walked down the hall "aisle" to become a beautiful bride.

Fast forward 30 years--I have now been a "bride" for 13 years, and while it hasn't always been a fairytale, and I certainly haven't always been beautiful, I have been richly blessed with a happy marriage and incredible husband.  I remember just like it was yesterday running down the stairs from my childhood bedroom in my sock feet, running through that same hall into the kitchen on the morning of our wedding and asking my precious parents, "Who wants to see me get married today??"  That night, for the first time in my entire life, my face hurt from smiling literally all day long.  It was a magical day, a fairytale wedding, and we were blissfully in love.  The next day on the plane ride to our honeymoon, we both fell asleep.  When we woke up, the flight attendant stopped by our seats and asked if we were newlyweds.  We asked, "How did you know?" She said, "Newlyweds are the only people on these planes who smile in their sleep."

Three kids, a mortgage, and juggling dual demanding careers later, needless to say we don't always smile in our sleep, and while we are happy, I don't think it would be fair to say all our days have been blissful.  Just like all couples, we argue about really important things like toothpaste tubes and the right brand of ketchup.  Sometimes, we absolutely drive each other crazy and want to scream.  But at the end of the day, I don't tell him enough how much I appreciate him as a father, as a partner in our crazy life, and, most importantly, as my Prince Charming, and I was reminded this week about what a blessing he is in my life.

The Mission Athens team very often works with single moms.  This week, we have met several moms who are struggling to make ends meet for their young children.  We have also met grandparents who are now faced with the daunting task of caring for their grandchildren.  I am quite certain that many years ago, these same families' faces hurt from smiling on happy wedding days, days these young women had dreamed about since their childhoods, days when it all seemed so full of hope and possibility.

As we all know, life is not a fairytale.  Just today, we met a mom who has escaped a violent situation, moved her family across multiple states with just the clothes on their backs, just to find a safe harbor from her interrupted life and false fairytale.  How terrified she must have been pulling out of the driveway, racing through the night, praying for a second chance!

In the book of Jonah, God provides us with a powerful example of His blessing of second chances.  As we all know, Jonah DID NOT want to go to Ninevah.  He had his own plans, his own dreams, his own fairytale.  God had a different plan.  Jonah made a series of bad choices that left him in the belly of a fish.  I can't imagine how terrified he must have been.  He must have truly felt he was finished, out of chances and out of hope.  And that is exactly when God blessed him with a second chance.

Perhaps the most wonderful blessing that has happened to the Mission Athens team this week is the opportunity to work with people who are not homeless, who are not destitute.  This week, we have helped families who are working, who are actively seeking work, and who are willing to study the Bible and learn about how God can offer them hope.  Even after their best efforts, it is still impossible to make ends meet and pay for housing, food, clothing, gas, and bills in this difficult economy.  Many of these people are working in jobs for which they are overqualified, but that job is the only one to be had.  It is an all too important reminder of how close we all are to needing a helping hand, a renewed hope, a second chance.

While I know that life is not a fairytale, I am so thankful for the gift of hope that God has given us and the comfort that we can be redeemed and saved by His powerful mercy and be granted an eternal home in heaven with Him.  Because I have been forgiven, my life is no longer my own.  My prayer is that my life will be a wonderful romance with Him, and that He will welcome me home at the end of my journey with open arms. 

While the Mission Athens team cannot heal the hurt that comes from broken promises and betrayed trust, we can pour ourselves out at the feet of those hurting to show them His love and the grace that He gives to those who fall in love with Him.  Tonight, my prayer is that just as He did for Jonah, God will reveal His second chances to these families who need His guidance, and that He will bless them richly as they recommit their lives in service to Him.  I hope that in the coming days and months, these special children of God will go to bed with sore faces, not from crying tears of desperation, but from smiling all day as they count their blessings, and that they, too, will fall asleep smiling, looking forward to the brighter futures God has in store for them.