To Love and Serve!

I recently asked Leah, what's it like in Africa?  She said, "mom you just have to be here to see.  The culture is just different." .I asked if I'll come home wanting to change my lifestyle. She said its just 2 different cultures.  It's not right or wrong, it's just a different way of living.
This past weekend I was able to go with some of our church high schoolers to Roseland, Illinois.  It is a very poor area in Chicago.  We stayed in a woman's shelter.  We were able to make meals for homeless and work in a second hand store.  This was a different lifestyle, a different way of living.  People had many different stories as to how they got there, but they were there.
I did not come home feeling guilty for my way of living, I felt grateful.  I appreciated my family, job and opportunities so much more.  I had a drive to listen and help others, that was not there 3 days earlier.
While with the youth, we had a time of Bible study.  One of the kids said, "this is not an attractive mission trip."  And you think about it, it's not.  There was nothing glamorous about the weekend.  Nothing even clean about the weekend.  No beautiful scenery to see.  But it was all reality.  We are called to love others.  As a coworker recently said, "to have tolerance."  We need to have tolerance of each other, kindheartedness, and help one another.   We need to show our kids the world around us, so that they can make an impact.  It doesn't always look pretty.
I often think of memories I have from growing up.  And its less and less, the things I thought were most important my teenage years.  I don't remember basketball games, or many dances.  I remember some fun times with friends.  But I can recall the times I was able to serve others.  Vacation Bible school downtown New York, picking up trash along side the roads, visiting elderly with my dad on Sunday afternoons.  And I'm sure I grumbled about doing some of these things.
Thank you mom and dad for showing me others way of living and caring for others.
I hope and pray we get more opportunities to go with our girls on these excursions.  Megan said to me, "this was my first mission trip."  I pray there are many more to come for all the girls.

Are you ok?

The answer to that question is, "no! But we will be."  It appears I've been crying all week about anything.  Goldfish crackers on the counter.  Leah loves those.  The Good Doctor.  Leah loves that show. I cried while making eclair dessert and kielbasa soup.  Leah loves those.  I cried while putting the twins to bed, that started a whole nother mess :)  And all of this was while Leah was still home :)  WOW, what a hot mess!!

I'd like to explain Leah for a minute.  She was a good baby!  (Obviously we went on to have 4 more :)  She was a rough toddler.  She was very determined and would not give in easily (sometimes at all.)  She use to ask what her consequence would be.  She was weighing her options on if the deed was worth doing.  As she got older, we could reason with her.  Talk to her.  She still may have made some dumb decisions (I still do :) but she understood, learned and moved on.  Her motherly instincts came out with her sisters, and from what I hear with her friends as well.  She became someone I wanted to (and still love to) hang out with. Her sisters are going to miss Leah telling them what to do for the next 6 months.  Some of us will miss watching Greys Anatomy and Bachelor with her (we will DVR them :)  Steve and I will miss her talking her sisters down while they are FREAKING OUT about something, when she says "I've seen mom and dad really mad, you don't want to do this."  (she tells them other things that we don't know about.  They all come back happy so we don't really care :)  We pray she can get up on time at the orphanage and be happy in the morning, but she's in Africa, its all on her now.

In my time of talking with God this week, I expressed to Him my sadness of letting her go and my joyfulness of her going.  And one thing I kept hearing back was, "thanks for raising her, I got this now."
I think I've shared this before, but years back, when Brooke was sick, Steve said to me, "Shelly we need to let her go."  Obviously that had to do with Brooke being so sick, but that has stuck with my parenting ever since.  As selfish as I want to be, these 5 BEAUTIFUL girls are not ours. I want to keep them in my home and in my arms forever.  But they are on loan.  God has their lives planned and laid out for them.  We are here to mold them and shape them, and pray they follow God's leading.  As I watch Leah, follow God's leading I couldn't be more proud of her, or any of my girls for that matter.  The love they show for each other, brings my heart happiness and peace.  A piece of all of our hearts is in Africa, right where God wants it to be.

"For we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do." Ephesians 2:10

God's got you Leah Rose!!!