One thing that really discourages me and gets me worked up is when people who call themselves Christians (I think some of them probably really are ) go into attack mode about something - whether against a pastor (maybe something he said) or a church or a christian author/book, or a political/moral cause they are passionate about. I remember this happening with Rick Warren when the “Purpose Driven Life” came out, and of course I experienced it first hand working at the church.

Now don’t get me wrong - there is a lot of stuff out there that is clearly wrong, against what the Bible teaches (can you say DaVinci Code), and as Christians I think we should point these things out and correct someone (gently) who is not in step with what scripture says. But I don’t think just blasting someone in attack mode, whether on a blog, or in a public forum etc, is the proper or pleasing way to address these things. And certainly we should be able to respond in love in a way that might open up a chance to lead someone closer to God rather than out of anger/fervent opposition that would drive them away or turn them off to us as Christians - ie, Christians are great at conveying what they are AGAINST (whether its abortion, gay marriage, or you fill in the blank about the Christian activist fighting so intently for a cause), but the world rarely hears from us what we stand FOR, namely the Gospel of Jesus Christ - who through His life, death, and resurrection offers us forgiveness from our sins and eternal life for those who believe and follow him.

I read a great post here about this that from Dave Burchett that I thought was right on - he was talking about the recent responses to “the Shack”, but the ideas and points he made were great for us to apply in any situation. Take a minute to read it.

Just finished moving my grandparents out of their house – packed up everything they “needed” into about 1/2 of a 17′ uhaul and drove it across country. We gave away or threw out probably at least half as much stuff as we moved, but still had at least 2 times that much stuff left in the house to have an estate sale. All of this after their house burned down about 10 years ago and they lost pretty much everything they owned. and they are such simple people, its not like they went out and got a whole bunch of other stuff they didn’t really use - its just eye opening to see that there is so much we have that we truly don’t really need, and ultimately one day it will all be left behind and not matter at all for eternity - we work so hard to get things but often end up not using them (anybody who has every purchased a piece of fitness equipment can relate to this one) but we can’t take it with us.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s all nice to have, but shouldn’t we strive to be content with just what we have or better yet what we need (vs what we want), as Paul wrote in 1 Timothy 6:6-8

“Now there is great gain in godliness with contentment, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content.”

Recently I also helped some good friends Mark and Michelle move. They were an inspiration to me on this idea of our possessions just being “stuff”. Check out Michelle’s blog as she shares some of those thoughts with a couple great posts.

It’s hard to explain EXTREME poverty to most adults in America - we tend to picture the homeless person, (with clothes and shoes and not usually a picture of malnourishment) standing on the corner with a message written on a piece of cardboard - will work for food, or some other saying. Seth Barnes had a great blog post here that really helped put in perspective the difference between poverty in America and “Extreme Poverty”.

I think this is even more difficult for the mind of a child - maybe we try to shelter them from the images of what real poverty is, or in reality, our American media rarely even highlights this issue. But it is real and we want to educate our children and allow God to form in their heart a compassion to help those who are in need, and to see how abundantly blessed we are and that we have a responsibility to be good stewards of everything God has entrusted to us to manage.

We try to use teachable moments - whether responding to a comment like “Daddy, I’m starving” (see this post), or why do we have to eat this? Or whether sitting together reading God’s word during family worship time and explaining that God has made us managers of all of creation, or why we don’t go out to eat as much as we used to (so we can save toward our adoption), or praying that our kids in Ethiopia or the ones we support through World Vision will have enough food to eat.

These are things that we believe are at the heart of God and things that we should teach our children, and pray for them that God would place love and compassion for others on their hearts. To read more about how others explain extreme poverty to their children, check out Red Letters Campaign.

I just finished reading “Red Letters: Living a Faith that Bleeds” by Tom Davis. This is a must read book for any follower of Jesus Christ, challenging us to live out what we believe to be the truth, specifically the “Red Letters” that Jesus spoke, and to start wherever we are to take practical steps to show Christ’s love to the world around us.

This book will challenge you to really consider the truth of James 2:14-17

“What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him, “Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.”

I encourage you to go to Tom’s Blog and read more about Red Letters and watch the video about why Tom wrote the book. You can purchase the book from links off his website to amazon, CBD, etc if you want or you can buy it local at Barnes and Nobles I believe. He also has a couple other books, including “Fields of the Fatherless”, which I am diving into.

Money and manure
By Greg Laurie

Posted on WorldNetDaily

The Wall Street Journal quoted an anonymous person who defined money as “an article which may be used as a universal passport except in heaven and as a universal provider for everything except happiness.”

Maybe that’s why heiress Christina Onassis, one of the wealthiest women who ever lived, made this statement: “Happiness is not based on money. The best proof of that is our family.” Shortly after that, she took her own life.

It’s worth noting that money is a very important topic in the Bible, and one that is addressed many times. You might be surprised to learn that half of the parables Jesus told dealt with money – and one out of every seven verses in the New Testament.

“You might say, “Well, I think I’ll just skim Greg’s column today. This talk about God and money couldn’t have much to do with me, because I don’t have any money to speak of. Really, I’m just getting by, so Greg must be talking to wealthy people.”

I guess it all comes down to how you define a wealthy person. If we say that wealthy people are the ones who live in Beverly Hills, drive around in a Rolls Royce and will only eat Grey Poupon mustard, then yes, those people are definitely upper crust. Compared to them most of us wouldn’t be wealthy at all.

But if you look at the rest of the world, perhaps a person living in Ethiopia or India, and compare them to someone on the lowest rung of the economic ladder here in America … that would be a very different story. You would have to say that most of us, all things considered, are rich in the eyes of the rest of the world.

What does the Bible say to people like that, to people like us? The apostle Paul writes: “Tell those who are rich in this world not to be proud and not to trust in their money, which will soon be gone. But their trust should be in the living God, who richly gives us all we need for our enjoyment. Tell them to use their money to do good. They should be rich in good works and should give generously to those in need, always being ready to share with others whatever God has given them. By doing this they will be storing up their treasure as a good foundation for the future so that they may take hold of real life” (1 Timothy 6:17-19, NLT).

The Bible mentions three things here to the person who has means. By doing these things, the text says that they will store up for themselves treasures in heaven.

Click here to finish reading Original Article post from WorldNetDaily

“You tell me the depth of a Christian’s compassion, and I will tell you the measure of his usefulness.” Alexander McLaren

I love reading Alexander McLaren’s Expositions of Holy Scriptures. McLaren was a baptist preacher in the 1800s for 45 years at Union Chapel in Manchester England. Charles Spurgeon referred to him as “one of the foremost preachers of the day”.

As I have been studying recently, it has really struck me that besides love and possibly humility, compassion is one of the most active, visible benchmarks of our faith. I don’t think it any coincidence that James, the brother of Jesus, after saying in verse 22 “prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves”, concludes James chapter 1 with verse 27, one of the most referred to passages on compassion and mercy - “Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of God is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained from the world.”

Colossians 3:12 tells us how Christians who have been changed by Christ’s love and God’s forgiveness should now act, and the things we should be growing in. “Therefore, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness (meekness) and patience

Ah, so true for us in America…

Daddy, I’m STARVING!! If you’re a parent, I’m sure you’ve heard this line before. It seems that summertime with the kids brings out this line every morning and then sometime mid-afternoon when the kids want an afternoon snack. We have made a habit to correct this false notion with our kids. I don’t think that most of us in America have any idea what it means to be starving - our picture is far from the picture of starvation that exists in many parts of the world.

This is a picture of an Ethiopian girl who was at a feeding center on May 9th - she is 3 years old and weighs 10 pounds. For more info see CNN article link and take a minute to watch this video to gain a better insight of the dire situation in Ethiopia right now.

Ethiopia has a special place in my heart since 2 of our kids currently live there. We hope (God willing) to bring them home soon - read more about our adoption here. This country is going through a period of true starvation and crisis, due to extreme poverty, food shortage due to drought and skyrocketing food costs.

We are looking for ways to help out, and today a friend brought a Pastor from Ethiopia that we met recently to our mens discipleship group to share with us about the orphanage and feeding program they have started, “Hope For the Hopeless” ministry.  We plan to visit the orphanage when we travel to pick up our kids this fall and bring back more pictures and more info and begin to spread the word.

If you are interested in helping you can certainly be in prayer for Pastor Surefel and his ministry as well as the millions who are starving in Ethiopia and you can email me if you are interested in sponsoring one of the 107 orphans - $20-25 sponsorship per month will feed an orphan through Pastor Surefel and “Hope for the Hopeless”.

While we were in Africa, we stayed a couple days with Kelly and Cherise Smith outside of Durban, South Africa - they are in the hardest hit province, KwaZulu Natal, where recent study estimates nearly 40% of adults age 20-60 are infected with HIV/AIDS.

We had the chance to have the Smith’s at our house for a couple nights recently as they are visiting the states. I put together a video from our time with them in South Africa to help tell part of their story as they travel - as we watched it with them the other night, Kelly informed me that in the 3 weeks they’ve been gone, he’s heard of 3 people they were ministering to that have died, including one of the children in the video.

Take a minute to catch a glimpse of what their ministry is about and what we saw in their part of South Africa. Among other things, they are currently working on securing funds for a building to establish a much needed medical clinic in their area.

While we were in Africa, we visited Pastor John Jere and his wife Joyce. They were not able to have children of their own, but were moved with compassion ti take in orphans and street children in Zambia, and God has certainly blessed their ministry and provided over the years. At one point they had more than 90 children, but due to a new government policy they were forced to send away over 60 of their kids who were over the age of 12, most of these they had raised since they were young children.
Please continue to pray for John and Joyce and for the kids - I can’t imagine the pain of having my kids taken away from me, or the fear and insecurity of being a child taken away from your mommy & daddy.

I loved being around the kids, even if it was just for a short time. They are so well behaved, so loving toward each other and visitors, and there were several of them that really captured my heart, wishing I could bring them home with me. Its difficult for 2 kids to get along in my house, and I can’t imagine how they all do it, but by the grace of God.

It’s amazing to see the joy in the faces of these little ones, knowing that they have been through so much. But these precious kids are surrounded by so much love and the teaching and hope of Jesus Christ, and it really shines through them.

They are getting ready to open the Jewel Baby Haven which will have room for 20-30 babies. We are excited to see the new babies that will be part of Samaritan Children’s Home.

Above is a video I put together from our visit to SCH.

Also a couple pics below.