Guest Post: Your Money and Mine

Today's guest post comes to us from Sarah Bess. If you read, Clutter Bowl, you know that she has a private blog. She loves to write... From little notes to us around the house, to letters, to gratitude in her journal. I know I am biased as her mom, but I thought this post was quite insightful for a 7 year old. I am proud of her big heart and generosity so I thought I would share. (editor's note. I did go ahead and hook you guys up with the correct spelling. If I hadn't, you would have had to be a first grade teacher to decipher).

By Sarah Bess

This blog post is about money. Let’s say your best friend’s parents don’t have enough money to pay for food. What if at lunch she/he doesn’t have any food? Here’s another example: what if you really want to help them?  But you have 100 dollars and you were going to buy an American girl doll? You did a lot of chores to earn the money.

THINK ABOUT THAT!

Are you already giving money?

Next time you earn money, do NOT use it for yard sales, toys, clothes, Lego's, movies. Do you agree? I do.                                



'Supermarket Sweep' to get food for a school backpack program we support called Nourishing Noggins.  

The Day

Last week we celebrated "Gabre Day". For those of you not familiar with the adoption world, there are lots of different terms to celebrate aspects of becoming a family through adoption. When a child enters your family born from your belly, their birthday marks that special day they entered your life. When your child enters your family born from your heart, it is very likely you may not have been there for their birth.

Gabre day is the day that we first met our sweet daughter in Ethiopia. The day we first looked into her eyes. First held her. First smelled her. First said those words we had desperately been longing for her heart to hear.  It is not the day she officially became a part of our family, which happened weeks later when we passed court. Or the day that she first lived with us, which happened months later when we took her for the first time out of the orphanage and to our first home together, a hotel in Ethiopia. Or even the day that our family of five was united together for the first time at the airport.

Gabre Day did not come with balloons. Or presents. Or songs. Gabre day came with pause and reflection. For me it is a day of joy and sadness. Sadness for all she has lost. Sadness because she spent months, both before this day and after this day lying in her crib. Sadness because there are children all over this world that lie in these cribs at this very moment. Waiting. Waiting for a family. Waiting to be loved.

But, oh the Joy. This girl is ours! This girl that brightens every room she enters. This girl that brings comments from strangers like, "I could just eat her. She is so sweet.". This girl that keeps us laughing with her growing language that includes "Suitcases" for her bathing suit and "Damn it" because she might overhear that a bit too much. This girl that now instead of spending most of the day in her crib, gets to spend the weekend at the lake...or at the beach...or at the pool....you get the idea, the girl LOVES the water!

Don't judge the hair. She had been boating.

July 10th marks a new day for our family. We will be hosting a 14 year old girl from an orphanage in the Ukraine for 6 weeks. Hosting was not something we were looking for, but here it is. And here is ALL we know about Inna. She is shy, calm and polite. She is in the 8th grade. She has a hearing loss and wears one hearing aid.  She likes to dance. Her favorite animals are horses, cats and dogs. She likes to eat meat and buckwheat porridge. She likes to watch soap operas and kid movies. She likes to do embroidery and work with bibs. Her favorite color is violet.

I know nothing about 14 year old girls. I know nothing about buckwheat porridge. I do not know Russian or Ukrainan. And she does not know English. I do not know embroidery. Sewing a button is an accomplishment. And bibs? I do know what they are, but have not the slightest notion of how one 'works with them'.

But I do know that research indicates that in the Ukraine, 10-15% of children who age out of an orphanage  commit suicide before age 18. 60% of the girls are lured into prostitution. 70% of the boys become hardened criminals.

So what is the future for Inna? I do not know that either. At times, that thought overwhelms me. But then I remind myself of The Day. Each day is different. But each day is fresh. Each Day that she is with us is A day we can show her she is loved. That she is treasured.  I love what Beth Guckenberger from Back2Back Ministries says about this,

 "Our family is like a big tree, and some people come here and rest for a season in it's shade and some for a meal and some for years. We are just going to love and live and share with whomever God brings to us."

Adoption, fostering, hosting may never be part of your life or the life of your family. But this Day is. Everyday is. And I wonder, who needs to rest in your shade? 

The Clutter Bowl

The Bowl

I have a daily battle with clutter. It's really not my fault, I grew up in a clutter free home. My dad dislikes clutter even more than I do. You wouldn't know I have this battle if you came to my house. You would assume that I waved the white flag long ago. There are the shoes that never seem to make it to the right place, the laundry that just keeps multiplying, and the legos. Oh, the legos.

Sarah Bess has a book where you imitate people's voices or animal noises. For Mommy, she says "Go clean up!" every time. How about "I love you". I say that too, right?

One of my sanity tips to handle the 'stuff' is to have a clutter bowl...or basket, or box located in several places in the house. I pile things in and then when it is overflowing, I try to clean it out and get things where they belong.


Sometimes, my  mind feels like my clutter bowl. Thoughts that I just don't have time to deal with at the moment, get shoved in my head until later. I have found writing to be the best way to 'clear my bowl'. And usually those thoughts come out organized together in some way. The past week or so they just seem to stay jumbled. But my bowl is full, so forgive me but I am going to write about them all at once. There are more questions than answers here friends.

The Speaker

A few weeks ago, Jimmy and I went to see Jen Hatmaker. It was AWESOME. I think I overuse that word- but really, it was. Many of these thoughts feel connected in some way back to those two days.

The Church Sign

OK. This has been bugging me for awhile. What is the purpose of the church sign that preaches to us from those little black letters? I pass one everyday on the way to and from work. And I just don't get it. Who is their audience? What is their goal? Today's message, "A clear concience makes for a soft pillow." Ok- thank you church sign person for that. I can not recall a single time where one of these signs conveyed a message of love. A message of, you are a child of God and He loves you. SB is the queen of signs- the spelling might be off, but I'm thinking these folks should hire her. Let's not condemn her because she once wrote on her own private blog, "My daddy is a cock." She meant 'cook' people. She meant 'cook'. And there's the fact that she actually gets that God is all about love.

Perhaps my all time favorite church sign one Thanksgiving:



Say What?!



The Deal

We are so obsessed with cheaper and faster. I don't know if this is a conversation men have often, but if you are a woman it always goes something like this. Woman 1: "I love that sweater." Woman 2: "Thank you, I got it on double clearance. Only 4 dollars."

We love 'the deal' and feel we have won something by getting it cheap. The stores are making a killing on this concept. How often do we say, "I went shopping and saved $40 on 5 dresses". No you didn't. You spent $70. And while we bought it cheap, what did someone else pay?

Please don't misunderstand me here as judging! Just this week I bought a $4 pair of flip flops for Davis at Target. I'm pretty sure the materials and the labor on that are not fair trade.

But I wonder, when should we be asking different questions. What were the working conditions of the person that made this? How much did they get paid? Were they a child? If I change my purchase habits, would it even make a difference?

The Neighbor
Jesus said, Love God. Love your neighbor. Seems like pretty simple stuff. Seems like really good stuff. If this is our message, why are people in America fleeing from churches by the masses even though we are making our churches 'attractional' aka 'cool' with awesome music and coffee shops?
Could it be that the message is clear, but yet we aren't? That we spend more time bickering over discussing who is our neigbor, than loving them. Personally I tend to be better at loving those far away than my actual next door neighbors. Maybe you are awesome at helping your elderly neignbor mow the grass, but  you struggle to think of the poor in Africa as your neighbor. Maybe you help your elderly neighbor mow the grass AND sponsor orphans in Africa, but you struggle to see that the troubled teen that is Muslim is also who Jesus meant as our neighbor. Regardless of your definition, what if we just loved the people that came into our lives on a daily basis. Just that.

And what if today we said, yes. Just that. I will love the people in my life. What does that even mean? What do we even do? Maybe it means we are open to listen for the need? Maybe we could just live our lives like the chorus to this Christa Wells song, "You've Got a Home",

Here's a key to my front door.

Got a pillow if you lost yours.

You got a seat at my table.

You got a home.

Here's somebody who believes you.

The truth reminds you

You always got a place to go to.

You got a home.