Right now Brooke and I are in the midst of training to help prepare us for our cross cultural service. I think the first thing we would have told anyone about our preparation up until this training was that we were clueless in what we are doing. It reminds me of a quote by my good friend Phil Dunphy from the TV show Modern Family when explaining his job as a realtor, “A realtor’s just like a ninja in a blazer. The average burglar breaks in and leaves clues everywhere. But not me. I’m clueless”. So with the bar set that low we knew we were in for a lot of good stuff.
One of the areas that we discussed first was simply being able to recognize joys and thanksgivings that are in each day. We, along with the 40+ adults and 20+ kids, have seen and felt firsthand the greatness of God in the way He has worked in each of our lives. And in the middle of all the “to do’s” in preparation it is easy to forget to stop long enough to recognize the joys and thanksgivings that are presented in front of us. We have been challenged to try and do this each day and to note those. Since everyone who knows me knows that I am an open book, a man who wears his heart on his sleeve, a man with no secrets, I thought I would share a few of mine from the first few days:
- Thankful for the continued opportunity to be outside my comfort zone
- Thankful for the church, family and friends that have supported us
- Thankful for the ability and opportunity to learn
- Thankful for beginning new relationships for both us and our kids
- Thankful for the joy in discovering the deep seeded biases and cultural norms that I possess
- Thankful for examples of strong marriages and Godly men leading their homes
- Thankful for the earthly beauty that God has created
- Thankful God hasn’t called us to live in a one room hut with no electricity and running water in South Sudan.
“Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; His love endures forever.”
1 Chronicles 16:34
One of the areas that we discussed first was simply being able to recognize joys and thanksgivings that are in each day. We, along with the 40+ adults and 20+ kids, have seen and felt firsthand the greatness of God in the way He has worked in each of our lives. And in the middle of all the “to do’s” in preparation it is easy to forget to stop long enough to recognize the joys and thanksgivings that are presented in front of us. We have been challenged to try and do this each day and to note those. Since everyone who knows me knows that I am an open book, a man who wears his heart on his sleeve, a man with no secrets, I thought I would share a few of mine from the first few days:
- Thankful for the continued opportunity to be outside my comfort zone
- Thankful for the church, family and friends that have supported us
- Thankful for the ability and opportunity to learn
- Thankful for beginning new relationships for both us and our kids
- Thankful for the joy in discovering the deep seeded biases and cultural norms that I possess
- Thankful for examples of strong marriages and Godly men leading their homes
- Thankful for the earthly beauty that God has created
- Thankful God hasn’t called us to live in a one room hut with no electricity and running water in South Sudan.
“Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; His love endures forever.”
1 Chronicles 16:34
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