I am not sure what the dealio is with the football references lately... maybe it is the hot summer months that have me thinking about the bliss of the fall. COLD, WE MISS YOU! Well, I do anyway.
In the movie, Remember the Titans, Herman Boone is taking a newly integrated football players and making them a championship team. At their summer training camp, he is yelling at them during practice: WE HAVE TO CHANGE THE WAY WE RUN! WE HAVE TO CHANGE THE WAY WE EAT! WE HAVE TO CHANGE THE WAY WE TACKLE! WE HAVE TO CHANGE THE WAY WE WIN!
After remembering this scene today, I thought of two things. One, I am so glad is not the norm for chicks to play football. I would have either told off Coach Boone or sat on the sidelines and cried. Two, sometimes if we want dramatic results in our life... that's right... we have to change some things up.
To say that I have to change EVERYTHING about my life to achieve happiness would be both overwhelming and impossible. However, I am seeing distinct areas in my life where God is saying, "That... that right there... needs to change." Sometimes change is about thinking out of the box, getting more creative, working smarter and not harder.
So, I think I will. Life's getting more exciting by the minute...
In January 2010, I was doing my usual bit: watching all movies nominated for Academy Awards. (Waste of time? I think not!) In one of the movies, The Blind Side, a well-off family takes in a homeless high school student, who also happens to be an amazing football player. In one of the scenes, the mom , LeighAnn Tuohy, is having lunch with her friends at a fancy restaurant. One of her pals says, "LeighAnn, you are changing that boy's life." To which she immediately replied, "No... he's changing mine."
Rewind about 6 months... I am standing on a cement slab covered by a very carefully placed tent with about 200 people. About twenty of us were Americans and the other 180 were African pastors from all over East Africa. We had more looks and smiles to exchange than words due to the language barrier. We were all waiting patiently for the session to start... and this was the important one: every single pastor in that tent was getting a brand new bible concordance for them to take home. Some of them had been preaching out of one book of the Bible their whole ministry, so you can understand the unspoken excitement in the room (tent). AND I... the American, who had about five Bibles in her house and three computers with Bible Gateway at her fingertips, was going to help hand out the concordances to them. I am changing these pastor's lives.
On the contrary...
So, we start teaching them about how to use this new reference book and I am watching them all. The way they carefully turn the pages as to not tear it. Their backs hunched over with noses close to the page to focus completely on the words. Hands being raised to ask questions so to be SURE to know how to use this wonderful book. Then, later... the pastors would carry these concordances around to be sure to have it if they needed it. I would see them lounging on the grass between sessions reading through it and studying. Their commitment and thirst for knowledge was amazing. Didn't I change their lives? No... they changed mine.
They reminded me to not waste my resources. They reminded me to not take my blessings for granted. They reminded me that giving is not all about what I am doing for the other person, but to look and hear what God wants to teach me through giving. They reminded me that petty situations are exactly that in comparison to what our REAL purpose is.
So, GIVE and be changed.
Mission Barnabas International is the amazing organization that I worked with in Nairobi for the pastors' conference. They have many opportunities for anyone to be involved on whatever level they want to participate: financial giving, donating items to be shipped to Africa and many more. Check out their website to see how you can be a part! You can also be their fan on Facebook.
I am not sure what the dealio is with the football references lately... maybe it is the hot summer months that have me thinking about the bliss of the fall. COLD, WE MISS YOU! Well, I do anyway.
