the assurance of things hoped for, the convictions of things unseen. Heb 11:1 ESV
As I looked out my kitchen window just this morning, I see 5 of our homeless friends walking around intoxicated in the cold like lost puppies,
I see the landlords of the house right by us throwing out the possesions of our neighbors who just got evicted this week after her husband has been deported.
We were told that Dave has "fallen off" again after a courageous run of being sober for 2+ weeks. Havent seen him in a couple days and our family misses his company.
I have the priveledge to work at Bethany Christian Services and seeing the needs of the orphan, here and around the world, and despite the great things happening and the families that are opening their heart and home to the orphan, sooo much more needs to be done.
Without Jesus, I would look no different then our homeless friends roaming through life with no direction or purpose.
So as we are beginning 2011, it is my prayer that my FAITH would grow (it is weak a lot of the time), that I would have more faith and trust in our Loving Father in Heaven and the struggles we have we know that God is able to sustain us and lead us, that our HOPE would be seen in our lives... And somehow in God's mysterious way.. he would use us as a place of refuge for other.
We live in a saturated place of "spiritual luxury" in Grand Rapids it is a unique and special place to live. God for some reason has blessed this area. We have strong families, we have many many churches that are committed to being true to the WORD, we have many Christian Colleges and Schools, we even have a Christian Publishing Company where books are being published and sent all over the world for people to read and glean from, we have wealth. We are so blessed here - but God's heart for blessing people is to be a blessing. To be willinging to leave our church pews, Christian friends and family, be open to leave the safe communites and to go. It is easier said than done. And even when it is done it is laborous, inconvenient, frusterating it also is life giving, humbling, life changing... as believers we have the FAITH of things HOPED for and the convictions of things unseen if we dont invest who will?
Let's be a people that God can use to bring heaven to earth. Let's be a people that loves mercy and justice and are walking humbly with our great GOD, lets be a people that are not buying into the rat race of life where we are to busy achieving and investing into things that will not last. Lets be a people that is committed to relationship with Jesus, our families and to the world. Jesus is the same yesterday, today and tommorrow. And HIS Kingdom is coming there is no greater calling than to go and make diciples. It's happening here and all over the world.
Jesus is our HOPE, he's the worlds HOPE. We have the HOPE lets share it.
PS Please pray for Dave, he's become part of this community and part of our heart. Dave needs Jesus, he can go and be sober for weeks at at time, but until he fills his need for alcohol/drugs with his need for Jesus - there really is no HOPE. Dave needs to surrender pray that he does.
