Archive for the Uncategorized
Friday, May 28th, 2010
Haiti: faces
Our days in Haiti were too few and packed with sights and impressions and reactions and responses and much to keep thinking about and praying about.
The first impression for me is faces. Even though we talked with only a few of these people, each picture of each face is a reminder to me: Every single one of these faces belongs to a person who has a name and a story that is like no one else’s.
Four-year-old Maynasia is one of the faces=name=person=heartbreaking story. Since the earthquake, she lives in a tiny 2-room house with her Aunt Maria who is not really her aunt, but is related distantly somehow, and with Maria’s children.
As we approached, Maynasia ran out the door toward us and leaped into the arms of the closest man of our group and threw her arms around his neck. Though she had never seen any of us before, she smiled eagerly into his face as if she recognized him and announced, “My papa died in the earthquake.”
My heart wept. What will keep this beautiful tiny girl, longing for her father’s strong arms, from growing into a gorgeous young woman who still throws herself into any masculine arms that present themselves?
There is one hope for her–and for all of us. Please let the photos be a reminder to pray that Maynasia and Giveland and Jean Baptiste and Louinise and Withlove and Roselene and Lorine and so many others in Haiti would know the strong arms of the Father who will never leave them or forsake them.
Sunday, May 23rd, 2010
I hope to see your generosity in Haiti
Many of you sewed for Real Hope for Haiti and sent items from their wish list and made financial donations to get those 2 containers there.
They have arrived and are being unpacked. So maybe I’ll see some of those cute pillowcase dresses or your Bumbo seat or treadle sewing machine.
Here are some photos from here in Minneapolis during the weeks of collecting donations and filling the container.
Thank you!
Debbie Woodward, the hero in charge of collecting and sorting all the donations
Zach Zachary in Minneapolis to oversee the container loading
Treadle sewing machine & (on floor) knitting machine
Sunday, May 23rd, 2010
A day off at RHFH?
At Real Hope for Haiti Rescue Center, where we’ll be visiting in a couple of days, even a day off is not a break with such needs all around.
Sunday, May 23rd, 2010
I need Haiti
I’ve been to Africa several times to several different countries. I’ve never been to Haiti — yet. This week will be the first time.
I know how Africa keeps affecting me, and I expect Haiti to have a similar effect. So as you watch this short video, just replace Africa with Haiti. Some of the details are different, but many are the same.
Then please pray for God’s work in us while we are there.
Wednesday, May 5th, 2010
Book winners
You are so creative and thoughtful and strategic in your ideas about where to give away a copy of Just the Way I Am by Krista Horning.
Congratulations to the 20 readers who have received an email announcing that they are winners of 2 copies of Krista’s book–one to keep and one to give away.
I’m sorry if you haven’t received an email, but I hope that will spur you to order copies yourself. People you care about need this book.
If you haven’t done it already, please read each other’s comments and be inspired to spread the word about God’s goodness and sovereignty in every person’s life, including every single one with disabilities.
Wednesday, April 21st, 2010
Finding free ebooks for Kindle
Thanks to Justin Taylor for pointing me to this blog with instructions for finding free current Christian books for my Kindle.
Monday, April 19th, 2010
More photos
Our talented tenant, Jenny, has posted a few of the photos she shot of Johnny and Talitha before the Father Daughter Tea on Saturday.
Tuesday, April 13th, 2010
I am David
I’m pretty picky about movie reviews–very picky, actually. The reviews I want are from friends who think like I do, who can tell me whether there is (even minor or suggestive) sexual content and what’s up with bad language.
I’ll probably look at “regular” reviews too, but I’m not surprised if I disagree in the end. That usually means I don’t watch even though the reviews are great.
Here’s a prime example in the other direction. My very good friend Karin recommended the DVD I Am David. Before we watched, I discovered the mediocre-to-bad reviews the movie received when it was first released.
But Karin said, “It’s a very good film. You ought to watch it.” I trusted her and she was right. How is it that I’d never even heard of this story before?
It is the story of 12-year-old David who escapes a Soviet Communist gulag (work camp) in Bulgaria in the early 1950s. He has just a compass, a stale loaf of bread, a sealed letter, and instructions to carry the letter to Denmark. David tastes freedom for the first time as he treks through Europe trying to follow those instructions. Along the way, he gradually learns to smile and even begins to trust one person, the woman who connects him with his life-changing climax in Copenhagen.
Artistically, the details unfold gradually through the story until the AHA moment that makes me want to watch again to realize the full implication of scenes that were intentionally sparse first time through.
Okay. Now I’m imagining the next question from my children, “Did you read the book first?”
Well, no. But I plan to. How can I resist it after enjoying the movie so much and then reading a review like this:
It is quite simply the best children’s novel I have ever read.
The story follows David from his life in a eastern European concentration camp to freedom in Denmark. Along the way David learns self reliance, finds faith in the God of “the still waters and green pastures,” discovers love, compasion and friendship. Through the book, David transforms from a victim to a human. I can’t remember the last time I cried reading a book, but I did several times with this.
If you want a book to teach a kid about self respect, love, forgiveness,and faith this is the book for you. If you don’t want a book that teaches these things it is one heck of a story.
Monday, April 5th, 2010
Time for flowers
Talitha and I went with friends last week to the Annual Flower Show at Macy’s.
Stepping off the elevator, I felt like the air was composed of totally different ingredients than Minnesota winter air. I could have been happy just to stand and take deep breaths.
I try to be economical (frugal, cheap, pinchpenny), but by this time of the year, I’m springing for a bouquet of spring flowers whenever I’m at the supermarket.
So this hour was a mini-retreat for me.
If you live in or near Chicago, Minneapolis, New York City, Philadelphia, or San Francisco, you have till this Sunday, April 11 to take in the flower show.
Friday, April 2nd, 2010
Autism: Loving people more than perfection
Last summer at our Minnesota Joni and Friends Family Retreat, one evening of worship ended with more worship than we expected.
Today, World Autism Awareness Day seems a good time to “rerun” the blog post with the video of those moments.
Wednesday, March 31st, 2010
Happy birthday, Barnabas!
On March 31, 1983, you were born–our last child–or so we thought. And so with you I experienced all those bittersweet “last time” moments.
(Of course, Talitha came along 12 years later and she was the real last one. But in the meantime, you–our first last–got to be the youngest.)
One of the results of being the youngest was finding out how many ways your 3 big brothers could make you look, act, be silly. And you went along with it all amazingly cheerfully. Strong sense of survival?
We thank God every day for you, Barnabas–for your dependence on the Lord, for the wonderful woman you’ve added to our family, and for your girls.
Wish we could be there to celebrate with you all!
I love you.
Tuesday, March 30th, 2010
A love letter from my husband
On Sunday, the last half of my husband’s sermon was the announcement to our people that he has asked for a sabbatical and the elders have graciously granted it.
In that sermon and in the letter that followed, he explained the reasons.
He loved me by acknowledging our need for concentrated time “for a serious assessment—a kind of reality check in the light of God’s word. Am I living in the mindset and the pattern of life that Jesus calls for here in Mark 8:31-38, especially in relation to those I love most?”
And I hope you noticed that he spoke and wrote as if all the need for this time away lay in his own shortcomings. I hope you are wise enough to know that things are never that simple. He loved me by covering for me–by being my protector. We’re in this together.
That was a love letter to me that you get to read too.
I pray with him that God might make these eight months the best Bethlehem and we have ever known.
