See Through Their Eyes

If you could only see through their eyes! The photo is of the new girls from Stella's House in a shuttle train at Frankfurt airport. We left at 4:45 am and had to be at the airport two hours ahead of departure, so they hadn't slept all night. Yet, as we waited for the plane for Atlanta, they wandered around as if they had been sleeping for a hundred years and had awakened to a brand new world! We got them to our home here in Montgomery and they stood huddled close together, looking at everything, whispering and pointing... Amazed! The dishwasher, trash compactor, our fish tank, tv, each thing was a discovery... a miracle!

The next day we went shopping. Chrissie helped them get shorts and swimsuits and other girlie stuff, and again the look of joy and a bit of sadness was so touching. They have spent most of their lives as captors in a cruel, cold world. Most had, until we came, never heard the words, "I love you!" They have been given commands to eat, study, sleep, but have rarely ever heard a kind, gentle word in their direction. The realization of the years spent just existing is only now beginning to dawn on them... It's very bittersweet.

But what about us? We live in this world of plenty, jammed full of things, every convenience at our hand, yet it seems we can be more deprived than they. At least when exposed to this amazing world we are blessed to live in, these orphan girls can see with crystal clear eyes the countless things they've missed. We, on the other hand, have had it all, all the time. The Psalmist David said "Keep back thy servant also from presumptuous sins." (Ps.19:13). He's talking about the sin of taking things for granted!! Is it better to have been deprived of blessing for a season, to then marvel in it's existence, than to have had abundance all the time and have never seen it? Hot water for most of the world is an unheard of luxury; clean clothes, unpolluted water to drink, the list will never end... Be thankful!!

The Girls are Coming

It's Sunday night here in Moldova... This morning we went to Cupcui to see
what is happening in the orphanage we have just taken over. It is exciting!!
To look at the place you would think that it's just been bombed in a raid in
Afghanistan! They have gutted it to the walls, but when the work is all
done, it will look like a brand new building! I can hardly wait to see what
it's going to look like! I am desperate, too, to see what God will do one
day in the lives of the children who will live here!

Right now Stella's 2 is a beehive of activity! The girls are in their last
days of school. Those who are leaving with us for America on Wednesday are
so excited, it's unbelievable... Most of this team have never been before
and are asking a million questions about airplanes. "Will we feel we are
going fast? Will we be able to go to the toilet? How hot will it be?" On and
on... I love it!!

If you can make it to one of the services we will have with the girls this
year, I have no doubt it will change your life! These new girls had never
heard about Jesus... And found Him, not because we told them, but from the
testimonies of the older girls in Stella's 2! We are seeing missionaries
rise up who can talk to these precious children, not from our perspective,
but from "sisters" who have lived in exactly the place where they have. It's
amazing! I know this: God is pleased!

Newsweek

I was sitting in Amsterdam airport a little while ago, waiting on my
flight. I had been in Scotland for some meetings and was returning to
Moldova, where Chrissie was waiting for me. In London, I had bought some
magazines to fill the time during my layover, and picked one out of my
briefcase to read. I glanced through the content page and one of the
headlines caught my eye: "The Saddest Country in All the World."

I was immediately interested. I skipped past all the world news and
latest disasters in the world. I had to know! Any guesses? North Korea...
Somalia... Haiti... Surely Mugabe's corrupt nation of Zimbabwe? No, none of
the above. You guessed it -- the saddest country on earth was... Moldova!

Here I was, sitting at the gate, waiting for a plane to take me to
the most unhappy place on the planet! Yet, that night as we sat at supper in
Stella's House, the joy and love was palpable. In each face, where we had
once seen pain, healing had turned sorrow to laughter!

I told them what I'd read in the news magazine and they laughed in
disbelief. "How could anyone say that we are so sad?"

And there, in the land that had been dissed around the world by the
experts, these incredible kids shone as the exception. What a difference
Jesus makes! So, if Newsweek showed up at your door today, what would the
report be?

Connect

In New York today, the Dow jumped 400 points. The cause? Germany agreed to
have a fund of almost $1 trillion to bail out some of the weaker European
countries that are in a financial crisis.

We live in a tiny world... A volcano in Iceland stops flights across all
Europe, stranding American and European holidaymakers and business people
for days on end and costing hundreds of millions in lost revenue on both
sides of the Atlantic. It seems as if we are tied together in an ever
shrinking world. When I first went to Romania twenty years ago, I could call
Chrissie from a hotel in Hungary at the border before we entered Romania,
and I couldn't call again till I was back there on the way home. Today I can
call from anywhere in Moldova... text, e-mail, whatever, all as if I was
home in the good ol' USA... Tiny!

On Mother's Day, Chrissie woke up and, unknown to her, she was getting
letters of thanksgiving from little girls on the other side of the world!!
Yet it seems even as our planet shrinks, we are more alone than ever. We
have more stuff, more entertainment, and our kids are lost in headphones,
isolated, alone!

Yet in the din of our shrinking, screaming, tiny, cramped world, we haven't
miniaturized as well as... God! He is global... He is molecular! He is
everywhere, yet, most importantly, He is... In us!

Turn your eyes upon Jesus
Look full in His wonderful face
And the things of earth
Will go strangely dim
In the light of His Glory and Grace!

Listen... He is connected to... You!

Facebook

Facebook!

Every day I get numerous requests to be my friend. I've finally made it to cyberspace! At first I called it spacebook (much to the embarrassment of my kids). I saw Facebook as a way to tell more people about what we are doing in our mission endeavours...

Until this morning.

I reached for my phone to check the messages that come to me each night from Europe, which is 8 hours ahead. My nights are often spent toiling over a problem or opportunity that has arisen in that part of the world, or a girl from Stella's House asking if she can get her bangs trimmed!! Then as dawn awakes here, my American day begins. This morning I checked my e-mails, then looked at Facebook. And I saw a portrait of... ME! Almost all the posts were scriptures or a video of a song about the song of songs, a thought written by a pastor friend, an exclamation of love for Jesus by a mom.

Unknown to me, my adventure into this new world would show me what and who is important. I don't want to get kudos for a baby lamb that strayed into my farm, or to ask for help fertilizing my field, or to build a building that doesn't or never will really exist!! I wouldn't want anyone to know I had so much time to waste! I want to be known as someone who works in real fields.. White with harvest! I want to save real lambs whose lives are at risk of being forever lost.

I want to spend my hours doing something that will stand the test of time!! Soo... I'm watching to see who else is in my field.

Hey... It's just a thought.