Today & 7

Fridays are days off... in theory. I think the nature of ministry is you take time when you can knowing some days off will only happen in theory. It's spring break week which creates a challenge for my wife and I. Our 8 kids don't have school but we still have work.

The 2 teenage girls had been pulling some baby sitting duty and had a chance to get away to Busch Gardens today...

Jody had a dental appointment...

That left me with the 6 littles...

Beach.

I already mentioned that it's spring break didn't I? Oops.

We drove from one end of Siesta Key to the other looking for parking. No dice. So, we headed to Lido Beach. Sarasota streets are already bursting at the seams from the snow birds/q-tips/blue hairs (odd names for the retired people who winter in Florida and then return home for the summer). That turned our trip into a more than hour long excursion - just to get to the beach. I had no real agenda today except to hang with my little people so it was no big deal. 40 minutes in Gretchen said "DAD HOW MUCH LONGER IS IT GOING TO BE??" (She doesn't have an inside voice unless she's being corrected and I'm waiting to hear a yes sir.) Matthew: (also lacking ANY volume control whatsoever) "YOU HAVE TO BE PATIENT!" Gretchen: "I'VE ALREADY BEEN PATIENT, I DON'T WANT TO BE PATIENT ANYMORE".

I totally get that.

I'm there with God right now. We found out not long ago that we have to move. We've been renting a house for the past 15 months that is much larger than the home we purchased back as a family of 4. The owner wants to move back in. In a month. I've been praying and asking God to provide in a way that honors Himself. So far? Nada. So, yeah, Gretchen... I totally get where you're coming from.

We made it to the beach. I love the beach. My wife would probably argue this point. I like to go, enjoy, and come home. She wants to pack overnight bags for everyone and stay for a week spearing fish for food and washing our clothes in the water. No thanks. That's the beauty of living 10 miles from the beach. You don't have to get your money's worth out of it in just one day. (end rant)

People look when they see our entourage. It's like a car accident or an 80 year old man in a speedo, you just can't not look. It's far more entertaining when I'm flying solo. Let's face it dads, a great many of us are totally disengaged from our families. We love them, but we are relational pygmies (no offense pygmies). It's easy to invest 70 hour work weeks to provide for them and difficult to spend quality time with them.

When we lived in Kentucky and my son was a newborn I just couldn't get enough of him. My wife is quite crafty (all meanings apply) and she made this baby sling. I would have called it a papoose but whatever. I loved popping him in there and going grocery shopping. (Moms need breaks sometimes dads, especially the ones who don't ask for any breaks. So, if you're worth your salt you will provide them.) It was laughable to see how people responded. The one thing I didn't expect was all the ladies who wanted to see exactly what I had in there. I have a larger than normal bubble of personal space. It would have been worth catching on film for a good belly laugh. Me being proud of my son (yeah, I made that) vs. the 10 foot pole rule.

I'm reading 7 by Jen Hatmaker and brought it with me. Somewhere in the middle of chapter one the alarms went off and I realized the perimeter had been breached - "'em 4 kids, you adopt 'em?" said the nice gentleman who clearly owned a "the south will rise again" t-shirt. I was so tempted to say, "which ones?". "Yes" I replied. "'at's awesome man, shoot(the oo part was much longer than I can adequately convey here), you just don't see that kinda thing. Really? Damn. Man. Wow."

It was interesting punctuation to the book that I'm reading. God calls us all different places and the same place at the same time. Universally I think He calls us to his side. Individually He calls us to preach, to start a prison ministry, to be an accountant, a lawyer, a stay at home mom, maybe even to adopt. I'm not always obedient. When I am things like that happen. Weird. It's like God was telling the truth when He said the world will know we're Christians by our love.

tough mudder vs the spartan

Last December I did my first ever obstacle race. 12 miles of running, climbing, crawling, balancing, diving, and being shocked. The Tough Muddder. It was awesome. I can't remember the last time I had that much fun. Almost as soon as I got home I started looking for other similar events. Last weekend I did the Spartan. For my own brain it would be worth comparing the two events. I have in mind to eventually try all of the events like these that are within reasonable driving distance which is probably less than 4 hours drive.

The Tough Mudder was north east of Tampa. The race took place over a Saturday and a Sunday. They release 600 runners every 20 minutes. There wasn't a lot of communication prior to the race but as soon as we arrived they were ready for us. Ample parking and polished logistics. The race itself took place on a large farm/ranch. Beautiful area. Mud was dark and rich and probably 20% mud, 80% poop. The 26 obstacles were well spaced out. We ran between 10 - 12 miles and probably never more than 1 mile at a time due to the spacing of the obstacles. The finish line greeted us with Cliff bars, bottled water, builders milk, gel blocks, a shiny tough mudder t-shirt and the highly coveted orange headband. After race events included live music, lots of fried food, tattoos, showers (i.e. hoses laying on the ground), a free XX beer, and the entertainment of watching people run thru the electroshock therapy obstacle. After the race you could search look up photos of yourself by entering your race tag number. If that didn't show up you could look thru the 3,568,742 pictures that were not labeled in hopes of seeing yourself or one of your teammates.

The spartan was held in north Miami at a state park. Same deal, the race took place over a Saturday/Sunday. Only a couple hundred racers were released at a time. As soon as you signed up for the race they started sending your daily workouts, VERY challenging daily workouts. We parked at a local college and rode a bus over to the race location. Lots of people were late for their heat because they didn't account for the 40 minute wait and the 10 minute bus ride. Bummer for them. I like to be really early. Beautiful setting again at a state park. The one bummer to the setting was that most of the course was on mountain bike single track. Lots of rocks and roots which wouldn't be a problem if I were a runner who wore normal shoes. I wear 5 finger shoes with vibram soles. After a mile the rocks starting calling to mind all of the colorful ways I learned to use profanity in the Army. There was a big swim at the beginning of the race. I'm a bad swimmer - not fun. The obstacles were not evenly spread out. At one point of the 8 mile race we ran 4.5 miles straight. The worst grouping of obstacles was at the end when we low crawled thru tar-like black mud and then had to traverse some vertical walls. I couldn't do it, not many people could. Any obstacle that you failed required 30 burpees. Bah. The finish line greeted you with bananas, powerade, some kind of funky green bar, a spartan medal and a cool t-shirt. Food and better showers followed the event. They gave every runner a chip which signaled cameras when you approached and tagged pictures with personal ID's. That should be really cool once they get the pictures up on their website.

Both events were great and totally worth doing again.

Wife's Blog

crazyjesterfam.blogspot.com

check her out. My wife's in on this thing now.

God is Scary

My wife is the best person I know. She recently made a comment that reminded me of when I was younger rocking out to Hall and Oats or 65 love affair on my record player. Sometimes the needle would get stuck and the same couple words and notes would repeat over and over and over and over... well, you get the idea. She was headed in a completely different direction with her thought than where it took me but in the words of Buckaroo Banzai "no matter where you go, there you are".

A week ago I received a gift. I have received this same gift every year for the past 3 years. I knew it was coming, like fruitcake but not bound for the trashcan. One of my guitar students gives me a sum of money every year at Christmas time. Honestly, I look forward to it. The materialistic side of me starts thinking in November about what I'm going to spend it on (not proud of that). This year was no exception. On the same day that I received my Christmas "bonus" I ran into an old co-worker. He and his wife left our church some time ago to plant a church. That's hard work. They don't make a lot of money and they have a lot of kids. As soon as I saw him the record started skipping in my brain:

Brain: "give him your bonus"

Me: "nope"

Brain: "give it"

Me: "uh... no"

Brain: "yes"

Me: "but I have plans for that money"

Brain: "so do I"

Me: "But we're the same. Aren't you my brain?"

Brain (or something else): "..."

Me: "Hello up there?"

Brain (maybe Holy Spirit...): "choose"

At that point in the conversation I had spent about an hour with this guy and I was in my truck driving away. I turned around. I wish that I had obeyed when I first was told to but I didn't. My friend thought I was crazy. I think I'm crazy. Not because of that particular incident but I can think of a few hundred other instances that testify to my lack of sanity. He tried to not take it but was persuaded when I said I had to do it to be obedient. Weird. I'm not one of those "God audibly spoke to me" people but I tell you, He made it difficult for me to ignore what He was saying that day; and I tried. I REALLY tried. Sometimes God comes in the gentle whisper and sometimes He's got a 5 pound sledge hammer headed toward your face.

So, back to my wife...

She said (and this is taken somewhat out of context) that there was no hope for the american church. This was rooted in the ideology of America that exalts the individual and individual happiness over everything. Don't agree? Look at your checkbook. Break everything down into percentages and if the scale tips in your favor... Don't want to use your checkbook? Use mine. The same thing would be true. The vast majority of what I receive goes right back to me. I make time for things that matter to me. I like to say some things matter to me that actually don't based on the allocation my time - not what I say mind you, but what I actually do. Checkbook's the same way. My sister loves big cats - bengal tigers, snow leopards - the kinds that are cute in stuffed animals but in real life would eat you. Her checkbook proves it. She has given to organizations that help protect the habitats of those animals. I would like to support those animals by feeding people that bother me to them. That’s not real support and not actually true (most days).

Proof.

Money = proof of value.

Digress. Sorry.

Back to the hopelessness of the American Church…

She’s was reflecting on a story about a third world country where an American had gone, behaved in a very “un-American” way and made a huge difference; so huge a difference in fact that a book was written about her. The context for that is found in our efforts to raise 8 children in the midst of a society so deeply entrenched in entitlement and self-preservation that the idea of losing your life to find it almost cannot be translated.

So…

What if the third world could be brought here?

That’s the endless repeat question and I need to think about it more before I finish that thought.

Part 3 or 4, I forget...

I have great in-laws. I love when then come to visit and am sad when they leave. We bought a used Honda Odyssey from my wife’s sister. She gave us a great deal on it. One day my kids were riding with my wife and my son asked when we were going to fill the other 3 seats up with more babies? So, 2 years later we’re a family of 5 filling all the seats. The foster family who had the 3 older siblings suggested that we might consider taking them all. My initial response was no way (with more explicatives than that) but, the idea would cross my mind every once in a while.

Almost from the beginning my wife was willing to do it. She developed a really close relationship with the oldest girl and that opened the door in our hearts to all of them really. December 17 of 2010 the 3 older girls came to live with us.

Jody and I love these kids now as if they were our own, really because they are. The adoption of them is in process and will hopefully be completed this summer. They have changed our lives in so many ways. We moved from the first house we ever purchased in order to accommodate a mega family. We have to take 2 vehicles wherever we go. We always have someone needing us for something. We always have laundry to do or something to clean up and at times it is overwhelming. We’ll probably have to build a house because there just aren’t any on the market that would be ideal for a family our size. Family has taken on a new meaning for both of us. I have 1 sibling and my wife has 2 so this is uncharted water for us. Our incredible friends, family and a church family are all sacrificially generous and supportive of us. We potentially have 6 weddings to plan/pay for in our future, 8 high school graduations, hopefully 8 college gradations and more birthdays than I can possibly remember (thinking about tattoos of them).

But.

It.

Is.

Great.

Our lives have new meaning because of them and we’re a family.

This is gonna be interesting...

Better than... well, anybody

It occurs to me that I am who I am because of the people I know. Most importantly, I am a Christian because I know God, specifically, God as He revealed Himself in Jesus. I am musical because of Dr Deakins. I love martial arts because of Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan and Brian Williams. I sing with soul in my voice because of Barry Cope. I sing for God because of Barry Cope also. I hate smoking because Matt Carson and I snuck out into the woods to fire up my first Marlboro Light and I almost puked. I hate the Tarheels because some kid I don't remember slammed me against a locker in middle school because I said I like Duke. I like Duke because John Sullivan did. I hate the smell of beer because I remember John Sullivan vacuuming up vomit from one of his friends who drank too much beer. I love the acoustic guitar because of Scotty Cope and Rob Harris. I am moral because my parents made me that way both lovingly and forcefully. I am generous because they are. I love TV and mindless entertainment because my dad does.

I am a good man today because a woman believes in me. A woman who is far more passionate about important things than I am. A woman who loves sacrificially in a way that I will never understand. A woman who lovingly and forcefully helped me to get to this point where we find ourselves in this journey. So, just to be clear, she's in all of this and this story wouldn't have happened without her. (who knows, maybe I'll con her into a post about how she got here)

Not Really...

In the Old Testament whenever the people of Israel had a new experience with God they came up with a new name for Him.

El was a standard name God with ideas of strength and power

El Shaddai meant God all sufficient

Jehovah Jireh meant God will provide

Jehovah Shalom meant the Lord our peace

The Old Testament really drips encounters with God so, there are a lot of names. My most recent experience with God made me think of a name for Him: El Loki. In norse mythology Loki is known as the trickster God. There are times when I wake up and realize that I'm not entirely sure how there came to be 10 people living in my 1500 sq/ft house. (The post below this would be part 1 and this would be ... you guessed it, part 2).

We found out about a family of 6 children who had gone into foster care. Another long-time foster family from our church that was caring for the 3 oldest suggested that we might be able to foster the 3 younger kids. Hearing that for the first time was like the first time I saw a quadratic equation. (Ray thinking to himself: "self, there's number and letters in that there math problem..."). It just wasn't even something I could process. To continue with the math analogy, 1 teenager does NOT = 3 children under the age of 5. Priority, regarding a sibling group, is that they stay together. Regardless of what happens with their parents the agency handling foster placement wants to keep brothers and sisters together. I told one of my friends once that if a brother had been placed with Mother Theresa and a sister had been placed with the Pope, the coalition would remove them from those homes if Hitler said he would take them both (obviously a wild exaggeration but you get the point). All three of the youngest kids were in separate homes. One of them was in a really great home that had done incredible work with him. The coalition (agency handling foster placements) placed the other two girls in our home. Almost overnight I went from a father of 2 to a father of 4. Within months that number went up to 5.

I remember hearing that my wife was pregnant with our second child, Gretchen. I remember feeling... well, honestly a bit indifferent. Now, I would fight til my last breath to protect Gretch. She is funny and beautiful and hard headed and precious to me but when I found out she was coming I wasn't incredibly excited. My first child Asa changed my life.

The equation went from:

me

me + Jody

me + Jody + kid (asa)

... and I was pretty much fulfilled. I didn't feel like our lives were missing anything. Before Asa, no kid. Asa's here? Bingo. We have a kid. I loved him so much I didn't really know how I could feel that way about another child. Hollywood would show a dramatic scene where I watch my wife deliver Gretchen and then the soundtrack swells to a crescendo as I bound through a field with my new daughter in my arms in slow motion. But, that wouldn't be real. It took a while.

That only serves to illustrate the point that going into fostering wasn't out of some quest for fulfillment for me. I firmly believe you don't have the right to say something, anything is an injustice unless you're willing to do something about it. Children shouldn't have to wonder if they're loved or not. Children should be safe. If the people who have these thoughts cross their minds even occasionally don't do something about it who will?

So, I put on my serious pants and thought, "we can make a small impact on a couple kids' lives even if we have our hearts broken in the process".