Apr 17, 2010 | South Africa, Stories
We visited another township this morning, and I am wiped! I had the privilege of washing some beautiful feet, some tiny ones and some big ones, and praying for God’s plans to come to pass in the lives of some precious children. Another sixty-some kids received a message of hope and a new pair of shoes. (Some Crocs and some trainers.)
My heart is swimming in circles from all this, and there’s so much more I’d like to say than I think I can communicate effectively at the moment. I look forward to sharing more with you soon, but in the meantime I thought I’d share a couple more pictures from Thursday’s distribution. A picture is worth a thousand words anyway, right?
To me, Africa has never been more beautiful.
xCC
Apr 15, 2010 | South Africa, Stories
Guys and gals! I mean it! I have three gabillion stories to tell you. We had our first shoe distribution today in a township not too far from the Muizenberg section of Cape Town called Overcome Heights. It’s a very poor area where some 6,000 people just showed up and built a settlement in three days because just before elections the government made some sort of promises that would have affected people living in that area. I don’t think they made good on those promises, but anyway, that’s not the story, I’m just wiped from a long day, so I’m rambling.
But one real story is, a bunch of kids were blessed today, with a message of hope, with people who care about them praying for them and washing their feet, and with a new pair of Crocs.
Crocs?
Yes, Crocs. Not the fake imitation ones either. Sorry, was that redundant? Crocs committed 1 million pairs of shoes to Samaritan’s Feet over a four year period, and 1,000 of those Crocs are here in Gordon’s Bay for us to bless people with. Ahem, with which we can bless people. I didn’t want to end that sentence with a preposition, but y’all I’m tired. My southern is coming ow-wt! Dern!
You have probably guessed that because I’m so tired, I’m not going to try to tell you all three gabillion stories right now.
But here’s one.
I saw this little boy today waiting in line just outside the area where the kids enter and hear a message of hope.
I was really sad at first because I saw that he had bare feet, and I didn’t think he had gotten in line in time. There were so so many little feet. Little little bare feet! There are always more feet than there are shoes. But I wanted this little one to get a pair of shoes!
Much to my delight, I realized he had a little strand of bright blue raffia around his wrist. The blue raffia was the magic solution when we’d forgotten yarn and we needed a way to count how many kids would be getting shoes. We’d tie a bit on their wrists and then remove it after they’d received their shoes so they couldn’t come back through.
So I rejoiced when I saw that he was going to get a pair of shoes today. Yay!
And then, I happened to catch him again later…Here he comes to have his tootsies tickled and receive a new pair of shoes!
In the end, we were running low on small sizes, and he got a pair that was a little big for him. See below? We passed them along to his mother and he’ll probably be sporting them tomorrow anyway.
It is tough to know what a drop in the bucket those shoes were. It’s estimated that 300 million people around the world go shoeless every day.
If you have time, please take a second to give that number a second thought.
You back? Okay good.
Mother Theresa once said, “If you can’t feed a hundred, feed one.” Today, among the many, there was this one.
And this one.
And this one.
And on behalf of “these ones,” I want to say thank you, Crocs South Africa, and thank you to those of you who have supported our ministry or Samaritan’s Feet. From the bottom of my heart, and from the bottom of many feet, many, many thanks.
xCC
Apr 13, 2010 | Stories, Travel..ling Tuesdays
Hey guys and gals. You are probably aware of the sad state of affairs regarding my MacBook. If not, just read the previous couple of entries and you’ll be up to speed. The jury’s still out on its survival. And now here it is, Travelling Tuesday, but without my MacBook, my iPhoto library … my crutches, I am in a poor state to create a beautiful and exciting TT for you! However next week, I should have some awesome shots from the shoe distributions happening Thursday and Saturday to share with you. And that will rock! And I will get it on this website if I have to drag it through cyberspace!
In the meantime I was hoping to ask you to do a little travelling for me this Tuesday. You see, my friend Arlissa is in the running for a Pepsi Refresh Project grant for $25K. Yes, $25,000. Whoa. I lived with her for a while at university and we ministered to international students together and I think she is awesome, and her artwork and her vision for ministry are fabulous, and forgive me for the run-on, I just think if anybody’s gonna use that $25K to the glory of God, she will!
So. Will you travel for me today to Pepsi Refresh Project and vote for Arlissa’s project, Visual Overture? You’ll also get there by copying and pasting this address into your browser: http://www.refresheverything.com/visualoverture. The grant will help develop her magazine, Visual Overture, and she’ll also use it to offer scholarships to other emerging artists. (That was a really basic synopsis, but you can read more on the site.) Way to pay it forward, Arlissa!
You can vote every day until the end of the month. If you decide to connect via Facebook, make sure once you are signed in to Facebook you click the vote for this idea button again. It should say Bam or Rock On or something. I think I might’ve missed two days worth of votes because of that little hiccough! I think you’ll hear the sound of a Pepsi can opening, too. HH and I had a discussion about that, because it sounds different from a can of Coke opening. I digress.
I hope to be up and running with some more deep thoughts and sweet shots soon. In the meantime, I hope you’re enjoying your journey today! Thanks for travelling for me!
xCC
Apr 12, 2010 | Stories
Just to update those of you itching to find out whether the MacBook survived its special baptism…the answer is, at present, inconclusive. It has started up a few times, which is really encouraging. But it has also fizzled out a few times, which makes me nervous.
We decided to let it dry for a while before we tried to use it anymore, and just before Hero Hubby left a wee while ago (airport run) he started it up for me. It started up without a problem. I finished what I was doing on his laptop and then sauntered over with bated breath and made a great attempt at not getting overly excited, only to find that it had perhaps either gone to sleep or decided now’s not a good time or just checked out because, hey, it has moisture under the keyboard and it’s not sure how it feels about that.
So, I’m optimistic and hopeful about the return of the MacBook. And it seems like the hard drive is fine, so if nothing else I can pop that into an external hard drive and basically use my computer on HH’s computer. Isn’t that amazing? But not an easy feat…plus sharing is hard.
If you’d like to pray for this great and trivial issue, I would most certainly appreciate it.
This week we’re balancing the impending arrival of two house guests, the forthcoming execution of two shoe distributions (yay!), and trying to bring together some tax information from the past three years and three continents which is another totally great story I am looking forward to telling you later and you’re gonna love it, all while operating a MacBook down at present! I’d say we’re doing pretty well since we haven’t had any fights yet! 😉
But a prayer or two never hurt.
xCC
P.S. If you don’t hear from me much this week, rest assured I am dying to communicate with you, but rather impaired by the present situation. It will surely resolve itself soon. In the meantime, I have been telling the Lord that I want to long for Him the way I long for time on my MacBook. Which I know sounds rather backwards, but I think He understands what I mean. And it sure gives me a lot to think about. 🙂
Apr 10, 2010 | Stories, The Parenthood
See this little guy?
The one you’ve (hopefully) come to love because you see pictures of him all the time, and we tell you how great he is?
Well, yesterday he decided to give a big glass of a very red drink a shake to see what happened. And it just so happened that the very red drink was right next to … my laptop. Hmm.
So. We drained it out, let it dry, and it started up later that night, which was very exciting.
But then it didn’t start this morning. Sigh.
So, we’re letting my MacBook dry out. Which is kind of a bummer because I was excited to tell you a really cool story today. I had it all written out and everything. But instead, I have this story for you.
The story of the Bear, the MacBook, and a very red drink.
If you don’t hear from me for a few days, you’ll know why. (I’m on Mark’s laptop right now, in case you’re wondering.) Please say a prayer for my MacBook. And another for the Bear.
We still love him!
We just hope he doesn’t try that trick again.
xCC
Note: No Bears were harmed in the damaging of the laptop. If it had been Da-da’s laptop, however, it might have been a different story. 🙂
Apr 9, 2010 | Baby Photos, Stories
The Bear tried on Dad’s slippers the other day. It was of course adorable enough for a picture or eight. We’re first time parents… Everything is adorable enough for eight pictures and some video footage!
I was thinking about how likely he was to fall over if he decided to try to walk, but he just kind of stood there, marvelled in the difference in size, smiled and climbed out before he kept on trucking.
I realized as I thought about it afterwards, sometimes I put on the wrong size shoes.
I’m not one of those ladies who’s a size 6, but 7 feels so good I wear 8. But, based on my comparisons with how other people are living, what they are capable of, what they do, maybe even how they dress or how they look, I begin to want to walk in different shoes — ones that aren’t the right size for me. Do you know what I mean?
It was obvious that the Bear would fall over if he tried to keep trucking in Dad’s slippers. He would’ve been hindered with every step, and it could have even been dangerous for him — his clumsy efforts might’ve landed his front teeth on the corner of the coffee table so that he could have his own fat lip!
When we try to wear other people’s shoes, instead of finding the ones that are right for the feet that God calls each of us to walk in, we are bound to struggle, perhaps even to try to do too much, to the peril of our health and sometimes our ability to hold ourselves together.
Finding the easy yoke, the light burden, the green pastures, the still waters… the right pair of shoes come from following the Lord. Ask Him what your feet should be doing today, and let Him show you what shoes should be on your feet.
We’ll let the Bear stick with these for now…
“Come to me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. ‘Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and my burden is light.” Matthew 11:28-30
xCC
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