Serving Others

Check out some of our future short-term trips below.  More details about each trip with deadlines and estimated costs coming soon!  You can click on the image to enlarge the picture or to print.

God Bless,
RJ

I was meeting a friend for lunch today and during our discussion we were talking about blogs and other sites we read on a regular basis.  I’ve recently started using a feed reader so I can quickly glance articles and blog posts from sites I frequent to see if anything catches my eye.  So, when I got back to my office I pulled up my feed reader from google and gave it a glance.  I noticed a post from a blog I used to read every day, but I haven’t read in a while.  The blog is called Stuff Christians Like written by John Acuff in Atlanta.

Todays post was called, “Judging who is poor enough for our charity.”  I decided to pull up the full post and was impacted by what he had to write.  Please understand that he uses a heavy dose of sarcasm in his posts which is very purposeful.

You can read his post here: http://stuffchristianslike.net/2009/12/1642/

Feel free to leave your thoughts in the comment section above.

God Bless,
RJ
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I’ve continued to think about my post yesterday about poverty and this morning I came across a great video and blog post by Allen Barton.  The video is shot in the same area in Ghana where my youngest two sons are from so it was very emotional to watch.  I think I have watched it at least four times now. 

The post is also written from the same area in Northern Ghana and Allen describes the offering at the local church.  I have so much to learn about faith and trust and giving.

Click here to read the post.

God Bless,
RJ

Worldwide poverty and the Christian response seems to come up over and over in my prayer life, books I read, scripture I read, and recently in blogs that I read.  I have a list of blogs that I frequent and many are from our supported missionaries or partnering ministries.

Yesterday I was going through my feed reader and clicked on a new post from the Water is Life International blog (one of our ServeGlobal partners in Ethiopia) and the post was entitled, “Sisters of Charity.”  The post was about the Mother Teresa’s Home for the Sick and Dying, and Destitute and how Water is Life was able to come and provide a well for clean water.  The post impacted me greatly and of course, it describes the horrific poverty in this part of Ethiopia.

I encourage you to travel over to their blog to read it for yourself.  http://www.waterislifeinternational.com/Life_Together/Blog/Entries/2009/11/27_Sisters_of_Charity.html

After reading that post I checked Brian Duggan’s blog (our supported missionary in Costa Rica and member of CAC).  His post was entitled, “Gratitude in Poverty.”  Brian describes a recent experience of being face to face with the effects of poverty.

Please read his post here: http://diggerduggan.blogspot.com/2009/11/gratitude-in-poverty.html

After reading those two blogs, I reflected on a book I recently finished on one of the flights I was on in China.  The book is, Less Than Two Dollars a Day: A Christian View of World Poverty and the Free Market.  This book was fascinating and eye-opening for me and if you stop by my office you’ll notice MANY pages turned down and a lot of underlining.  One of my favorite quotes from the book is in the last chapter and I’ve posted it below.

The underlying problem that motivates this book is that tens of millions of people like my friend Esther still lack basic sustenance.  The Human Development Report, 2005, compares poverty to the tsunami that struck Indonesia in 2005.  The tsunami was a highly visible, unpredictable, and largely unpreventable tragedy.  Other tragedies are less visible, monotonously predictable and readily preventable.  Every hour more than 1,200 children die, but they do so away from the glare of media attention.  That’s the equivalent of three tsunamis a month, every month, directed exclusively at the world’s most vulnerable citizens-its children.  The causes of death will vary, but the overwhelming majority can be traced to a single pathology: poverty.

I wish I had a great closing paragraph or thought, but I honestly don’t.  I’m simply wrestling through this and asking God how I should be involved.  I would love to have your input, thoughts, questions, and comments so please consider emailing or commenting.

God Bless,
RJ
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