Annual Conference is Over

Yea, it's over and it all went smoothly this year. My sincerest thanks to all the churches and individuals that donated to Methodism's Breadbasket! Royce City completely filled up the trailer with over 100 baskets for senior citizens. I think there were quite a few people who were sorry that they had not paid attention to the collection or project after the Breadbasket folks gave their speech. I hope that we've planted some seeds that will really help them to serve the population around that part of town. There is something about hearing the plight of the elderly and their delimma over choosing between medication and food that really breaks the heart. We know that God is unhappy over that.

Librarians Can Be Missionaries Too

In May I met with Becky Harrell, a GBGM missionary to Chile, South America. She used to be a librarian.

One day she decided that she would like to volunteer her services for a few years and live off of her savings. After contacting the GBGM Mission Volunteers program, she was asked to go to Chile. She said no at first, but then she changed her mind after "coincidentally" meeting someone from Chile that very SAME day! He had even lived in the town she where she was asked to serve. So she had to say yes, knowing that God was calling her to serve there.

After several years there, they made her an official GBGM missionary. She is the Coordinator of EMANA (Extension Metodista al Niño Andino) in the north of Chile. Becky says every time they have a hardship in the ministry, they pray about it. Every time, God's providence appears and makes the ministry continue.

Satisfaction

Yesterday I read a great quote (my paraphrase) "To find one's satisfaction in satisfying God...is the utmost possible satisfaction." Sometimes the things we do in the church have nothing to do with satisfying God but rather only satisfy ourselves. Isn't this a good measure of what we are doing, to ask ourselves "Would God be satisfied with this (or by this?)"

I found this idea in a book by theologian Charles Hartshorne and he was quoting someone named Fetchner. I think it gives me insight into why I find my position so incredibly satisfying. Sometimes I wonder when I will reach the point that I find myself yearning to do something else. Maybe I never will.

This Really Happened

Last night at dinner I told my nine-year-old that I had some questions for him. I asked "What is the first book in the Bible?" He thought for a moment, then said positively "Guiness!" It sounds like a joke but this is a true story.

Then I asked "Who were the first man and woman?" This was harder. Still, he came up with an answer..."Mary!!"

Vietnam and Agent Orange

Last week the General Board of Global Ministries was here and hosted the first ever "Mission Initiatives Summit" in Plano, TX. Since I couldn't go to all the breakout sessions, I asked a friend to go to the session on Vietnam.

This friend listened to our UMC missionary to Vietnam talking about Agent Orange and all the disabled persons that are a result of that poison. As the missionary described the difficulties of the disabled persons in their ministry, my friend realized that her twenty years of experience as a Special Education teacher and her work on the conference Disability Concerns task force can help this missionary immensely.

Now she wants to engage in "Risk taking Missions" herself and go to Vietnam! While she was telling me this, another friend who is the VIM coordinator for Louisiana came up and mentioned that he is taking a team to Vietnam in 2009, and that she can join that team. I am excited to see how this all comes about.... but to me this is WOW!!!

It's important

I wanted to start this blog as a place to write down all those moments that give me chills...the moments when you think to yourself "my job is great" or "this is why I'm in the ministry" or just "thank you God!"

Recently I was asked to make a list of the greatest accomplishments of the past year, and I realized that the real greatest moments for me are not the huge life-changing kind that you just remember forever.

Plus I heard that it's more important to remember the "output" moments, where you recognize that your ministry has made a difference, rather than remembering the projects and events where you put in the most effort or "input". That's when I realized my list of accomplishments contained projects that I'd spent a lot of time on but weren't really the "aha" moments.

So this is my effort to record those times.