What if

What if the world stopped spinning for a minute. Stopped swirling and spewing, just stopped. 

Please just stop a minute.

What if we dropped to our knees with EARS WIDE OPEN and WIDE MOUTHS SHUT.

What if we sat so silent, so still, and we listened so intently that we could hear the impossible.

What if we breathed so deeply that we cleared out all the noise of sides and agendas and fear and hate.

What if we closed our eyes so tightly all we could see is our mutual story.

Are you listening?

Can you hear our hearts beating and breaking and beating and breaking? Together, the same.

What if to move forward, we have to go back?

Way, way back before American laws or politics or slavery or segregation, colonialism or cotton. Back to a cross on a skull hill where innocent blood set us ALL FREE.

What if, in this still and silent posture, we sit at that cross and remember the cost of our salvation.  

What if we listened to the only words that matter. What if we LISTENED?

What if we had only listened.

What if we actually LOVED with kindness. What if we gave love that is unselfish. What if we always forgave. What if we always pursued truth and justice. 

What if we led with wisdom that is pure. What if we were peace loving and gentle and showed mercy.

What if we showed no favoritism. What if we were all created and treated equal?

What if we cared for the orphans and widows and hungry and imprisoned. What if we see those who are mistreated, as if we feel their pain in our bodies. 

What if we cared more about listening to the creator of the universe than the rhetoric of political parties.

What if we stopped making assumptions and pointing fingers and blame and guns with prejudiced bullets.

What if we just stopped and listened?

Are you listening?

Can you hear His heart breaking and breaking? 

What if we stopped demanding for what's ours and mine. What if instead we asked, what can I do for you and yours?

What if we loved our neighbors as ourselves and treated others as we want to be treated?

What if we rise from our knees and open our eyes only to see through another's?

What if you listen to my story and I see your story and not your skin and we change the world together one story at a time.

What if I hear your cry, and I take your hand and cry with you instead of silencing your tears?

What if I'm willing to lay down my life for yours?

What if it all comes down to this: Life is just a test. And the only passing grade is LOVE ONE ANOTHER.

"Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God. But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love." I John 4:7-8

Life Isn't Fair, But We Can Be

It's what we all really want, and the elusive thing we seek, when we fight for justice. FAIRNESS. We think: work hard and it should pay off; do good, get goodness; follow the rules and laws, and live free.

But TRUTH is? Life isn't always fair. For millions and millions of people, life has never been fair. They were born into UNFAIRNESS. I'm learning just how truly unfair it is for people born outside the USA. Recently, I joined a women's Bible study group, and we began reading Jen Hatmaker's book, Interrupted: When Jesus Wrecks Your Comfortable Christianity. Have you read this book? It will WRECK YOU. At least, it has wrecked me. It has turned my perspectacles upside down and backwards, and it has confirmed a direction my heart had forgotten but is excitedly remembering. It has added fuel to a fire in me that was dormant for many years.

When I was younger, I had missionary dreams, and I had dreams of building housing for the homeless. Simply, I had dreams of helping others, which were inspired by serving God. But as I grew into an adult, the pursuit of my version of the American dream - college degree, husband, kids, house, meaningful career, etc. - clouded out all those altruistic goals; life became about the pursuit of my own happiness. College degree, check. Husband, check. Babies, check. House, check. But happiness? Hmmm. . . nope. As I acquired all of the ingredients of my dream, the weight and pursuit of possessions drug me into some dark places. My ego became bigger and my altruism became dependent on if my "needs" were met first. My "Needs." Ha!

I have always had everything I ever needed and most of what I wanted, but I wasn't happy because I wanted more. I wanted to be important. I wanted to be SEEN and APPRECIATED. I wanted nicer things, a magazine-worthy home, better clothes...that STUFF that our privileged American culture sells us as necessary to happiness. And the more I focused on the goal of making myself happy, the less happy I became. 

This idea that we need nice stuff to make us happy - that we need to achieve "success" to make us fulfilled -it's a lie. It's a slick commercial. It's false advertising. It's idolatry. And worshiping things and status instead of God, is the fastest road to despair we can travel.

"Jesus replied, 'You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally as important: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'" (Matthew 22: 37-39). Look as hard as you want, but there is NO commandment that says love yourself first. Love your home. Love your clothes. Love your car. Love your job. Nopity nope nope. In fact, Jesus says not to worry about all that stuff. Not sayin' we shouldn't have it, just that we shouldn't WORRY about it. 

"In the end, only kindness matters." These words from this song, Hands, by Jewel started playing over and over in my head several months ago. And I realized there is TRUTH in those words. They are like scripture. They are almost HOLY. 

I think He has been preparing me to face the truths I was slapped with when I started reading Interrupted. My heart and soul were almost there. And. Then. I started reading the wrecking-ball of a book. In it Jen Hatmaker lists some incredible statistics about how the rest of the world lives. These stats brought me to tears and tore several selfish desires right out of my head. I think you must read them for yourself (page 22 & 23 of the Bible Study version of Interrupted) in order to understand. But I am there. I am at the place where I no longer care about acquiring more for myself; I am focused on how can I give more to others. How can I even the playing field? Because in America, we have the home team advantage at every single game. Our poor are the richest in the world. They have access to help: food stamps, food pantries, homeless shelters, and thousands of charitable organizations and humanitarians. Our $50,000 (an approximate number throwing out highest paid) average household income puts us in the top 1% in the world.

While we in the middle class feel like we struggle to pay for health care and car payments, IPhones, and $1500 mortgages, there are MILLIONS in the world who still struggle to find clean drinking water, die from starvation and disease, and are sold into SLAVERY. Did you know that there are more people enslaved today than EVER BEFORE?

So my car is 10 years old. Whatever. It runs and gets me from place to place. So I haven't bought new clothes for myself in about a year. Whatever. I have a closet full. My kitchen is nobody's dream. Whatever. I have a fridge, a stove, and a sink with running water. And I am extremely grateful that I don't have to cart water from a dirty river to do my laundry or dishes.

So, how can we make life more fair?

At one of our Bible study meetings, one of the women voiced her concern about where the goods she buys - shoes, clothes, etc. - come from. She wondered if when she bought items from the common retailers, is she contributing to children working in sweatshops? Are the people making the products we buy earning a fair wage? 

And I wondered, am I contributing to human trafficking by buying from certain companies? Do the women in India, who make the clothes I purchase from Old Navy, have clean drinking water to give their children?

These questions sparked a fire in me, and I began researching. It may seem small to you. Or it may seem big to you. But here is one way we can all make a difference: we can put our money where our heart is. We can make an effort to buy fair-trade or American-made products. Yes, they can be more expensive. Yes, there aren't as many choices. But, the more we buy, the more there will be more.

I have barely scratched the surface on the topic, but I want to share what I have found BEFORE we all complete our Christmas shopping. So, here are some links and other tidbits I've learned so far: 

• If you go to fairtradeusa.org, you can find a list of companies selling fair trade certified products. Everything from sugar to coffee to clothing is available. 
• BJs sells some baked goods made with fair trade certified sugar. 
• Flint and Tinder is a company that sells products (mainly underwear) which are 100% made in America. And they sell a 10-year Hoodie which looks super comfy and are guaranteed to last.
• Room and Board is a furniture company that actually sells attractive furniture that is American-made and at reasonable (but not inexpensive) prices.
• HAE Now sells organic, fair trade tees at a fair price, and if you want to sell your OWN line of shirts, they sell wholesale and will label your shirts for you. They sell baby and toddler onsies too.
• When shopping for gifts, we can look at the Greater Good website, which was "Created to help women worldwide gain economic security for themselves and their families by earning fair wages for their handiwork, Global Girlfriend sources women-made, fair-trade imported, eco-friendly products. By supporting long-term partnerships with the artisans, it fosters equal employment opportunities, healthy and safe working conditions, technical assistance, and development strategies to help reduce poverty, one community at a time. Become a "Global Girlfriend" and help build a brighter future for girlfriends around the globe!"

If buying fair trade isn't your style, here are some other ideas: Buy food to donate to a local food pantry. Sponsor a child. Or adopt a child! Buy a family a goat. . . The possibilities to make the world more of a fair place are truly endless.  

May you have a very Happy Thanksgiving. We truly have so much to be thankful for!

Love,

Ashley

"Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you fed me. I was thirsty, and you gave me a drink. I was a stranger, and you invited me into your home. I was naked and you gave me clothing. I was sick, and you cared for me. I was in prison and you visited me." -  Matthew 25:34-36

On the Kindness of Strangers

With all the crazy going on in the world, it's easy to see the darkness and evil looming. But when you look a little closer, there is an amazing thing happening in our communities.

I think I might call it a Culture of Kindness. There is this reach for being better humans. A brainwashing of niceness you might say. You can find it in the anti-bullying ads and in the rules at elementary schools. You can find it in television ads of the big box stores, advertising how they are giving back to schools. Even our favorite musicians are getting in on the act. Like we needed another reason to love Tim McGraw? I mean really. Giving away homes to military vets in those tight T-shirts he wears. . .HOW KIND!

This kindness phenomenon struck me the other day when I took my daughter to the doctor for her annual physical. We sleepily waited for about half an hour to see the doctor on a Saturday morning. Who schedules Dr. appointments at 8:30 am on a Saturday anyway?

This mother sucker, that's who. 

And if you know me at all, you know I hate getting up early for anything on the weekends. BUT, in order to see this particular doctor, I would drive an hour or more at any time of the day. Here's why:

Dr. Deluca enters and in her typical way greets my daughter with energetic cheerfulness. (She is a morning person by nature and a mother of 3, and kind of my hero). She proceeds to exclaim that Ali is just ADORABLE. Then she examines and asks my 10-year-old the typical physical questions. How do you sleep, eat, poop? Do you wear your seat-belt and bicycle helmet, etc. . . But then she asks about her friends at school and if she is mostly happy or mostly sad. And when Alexandra answers with 100,000 words and says she has really good friends but describes this one "friend" who drives her crazy, the good doctor LISTENS. And she responds, "Well, we don't have to like everyone, but you do always have to be kind to them, right?"

Then. This doctor, who has only seen my daughter a handful of times, anoints my child - not literally with oil or anything, but she speaks words into her life. She tells her that she sees her being a leader, a role-model. At which Ali looks at her quite dubiously. Can you hear the brainwashing? This woman, basically little more than a stranger to my child, has in a small amount of time, made a little girl feel good about herself, reaffirmed the ideals I teach my children about kindness, and encouraged her be a role model.

I see this Culture of Kindness more and more in this messed up sinful world, and it makes me so happy. When we are kind to strangers, we are doing God's work. Plain and simple. You want to know how to be happy? Be kind to strangers. Want to know how to be a "good" Christian? Be kind to strangers. Wanna go to heaven? BE KIND TO STRANGERS.

This morning I read in Matthew that exact admonition from Christ himself.

"Then the King will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you fed me. I was thirsty, and you gave me a drink. I was a stranger, and you invited me into your home. I was naked and you gave me clothing. I was sick, and you cared for me. I was in prison and you visited me." -  Matthew 25:34-36