Stewardship

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Enough Already

How well do you deal with your finances? Is everything under control, or is this a major issue in your life?

Pete and I recently had the privilege of going to hear Ron Blue speak. He’s well-known in financial circles as a financial advisor, helping people with estate planning, philanthropy,  and investment management—all according to Biblical principles.

While most in the audience were wealthy enough to need a financial manager, we snuck in on the coattails of others. Still, his advice applies to everyone, no matter how much money we have or don’t have. In fact, it was very simple: practice contentment.

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Downsizing Dad

This week we’re moving my dad into assisted living. He’s been in an “independent living” apartment at the same complex for the past 7 years, but that just isn’t working anymore. I had been fretting this decision for months. What would he think? Would he go willingly? Or would he see this as the beginning of the end, and resist change?

We had a nurse from the facility come and do an “activities of daily living” assessment, and she agreed that my dad’s lack of short-term memory was severe enough to warrant this move. So, with much prayer, Pete gently broached the topic a few weeks ago, over our weekly Sunday lunch out. Why Pete, and not me? Well, Pete is much more tactful.

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Swazi Trip Update

(If you missed the rest of my posts about my upcoming mission trip to Swaziland, you can read them here, here, here, and here.)

We have plane reservations! I’m staring at a piece of paper listing our flights… a red-eye from Denver to London, then another red-eye from London to Johannesburg. When we finally arrive, at 7 a.m. local time, bleary and jet-lagged, we’ll board a van provided by Children’s Hope Chest (CHC) and drive the six or so hours to our home base in Manzini, Swaziland. I hope I can still function that afternoon!

Thanks to God nudging some extremely generous folks, my support is slowly coming in as well. Although I missed the first deadline (we were supposed to raise $1,500 by the end of May to pay the deposit on our plane reservations), I’m on track for the next one—$3,000 of the $3,500 total is due at the end of July. As of last week, my account contained over $2,300—what an incredible answer to prayer!

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Don’t Muzzle the Ox

Young_oxen_Wikicommons-001

I’m in the middle of raising the funds needed for my mission trip to Swaziland this October. A number of exceedingly generous people have contributed to my church account, but I have a long way to go. I admit, I’m struggling.

It’s not that I doubt God’s ability to provide. Pete and I have a long track record of God meeting our every need, even when things looked humanly impossible. My God is a God of miracles.

It’s not that I doubt my “call” to go on this trip. God clearly told me to go. I hadn’t even considered going to Swaziland before I heard his prompting, so I know I wasn’t confused by my own desires. The way he has put his motivation into my heart confirms his direction.

No, the problem is that I have a hard time asking anyone for money.

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Please Support My Trip to Swaziland

swazikid-chc-001For the past few months I’ve been writing about my upcoming mission trip to Swaziland. I’ve prayed, researched the country, prayed, researched the organization we’ll be working with, prayed, attended team meetings, prayed, worked long hours in our church cafe to help raise the needed funds, prayed, and prayed. Now the time has come to raise up a support team. Yes, I need to send out a letter asking people to pray for me and to give financially toward the trip expenses.

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Out of the Wilderness

I guess we’re not in the wilderness any more.

If you’ve been reading my blog for any length of time, you know that since about 2005 our finances have been a bit… sporadic. While Pete worked full time (and more), and I cared for my elderly dad, started a business, and continued with the volunteer ministry God placed me in, we’d only get a paycheck every few months. We used up our savings, we simplified our lifestyle, we prayed—a lot! And God provided.

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Where’s the Water?

Storm moving in_XG_20090826_LAH_9761Where’s the rain? We haven’t seen a storm like the one in this photo for several years. In spite of our recent snow (finally!), Colorado, like much of the nation, is experiencing severe drought. Last year brought only half our average precipitation, and the preceding years haven’t been much better. With water rationing looming in the near future, we might be feeling a down. After all, who likes a brown lawn?

I garden for pleasure, to make my flower beds look attractive, and to provide fresh, healthy food that supplements what we buy at the grocery store. Farmers and ranchers, on the other hand, raise food for their livelihood—and so we’ll have something to buy at when we go shopping. A lack of water can be catastrophic, not only for their bank accounts, but for all of us who depend on their products.

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Lavish

Snow GeeseAs you read this, Pete and I are off enjoying some much-needed R&R. More specifically, we’re at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge, an hour plus south of Albuquerque, New Mexico. Imagine 50,000 white Snow Geese, an undulating floe covering the waters of a shallow lake, then, with a tremendous honking and flapping of wings, rising en masse to fill the dawn sky. This has to be one of God’s most incredible spectacles!

Bosque del Apache is also the winter home for thousands of Sandhill Cranes, ducks, and other birds… and hundreds of birders and nature photographers. Our coming here was my 2012 Christmas present from my dad. It’s just what I wanted.

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Loving One Another

Continuing the series on What to Give God for Christmas…

Jesus didn’t stop with telling us to love God with all our heart and soul and mind and strength. He wants us to love other people as much as he loves them. That’s a tall order! How do we go about loving others?

There are as many ways to love others as there are others to love. This is where we get to be a bit creative.

By all means, do something special for those on your Christmas list. One of my love languages is “gifts” so I can appreciate how well a carefully chosen present will convey the love of the person giving it. Even here, there are ways to help others while blessing your friends and family. I always check out the gifts on fair trade websites, especially for those hard-to-shop-for people; these organizations are a good source of handmade, one-of-a-kind items. For starters, I recommend Trade As One. I’ve been more than pleased with both their products and their service. (See last year’s post on fair trade.)

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What God Wants for Christmas

What do you want for Christmas? As small children sitting on Santa’s lap, we quickly learned to rattle off a long list of our desires—mostly things we’ve seen in ads on TV. Now that we’re older, we still have our lists, posted online at the request of family members trying to assemble a Christmas shopping list.

As the primary gift shopper in our household, I was scanning these lists when the thought occurred to me… what does Jesus want for Christmas? After all, it’s his birthday!

I was reminded of a passage I read recently—found in both Matthew 16:23 and Mark 8:33—where Jesus tells Peter “Get behind me, Satan! … You do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.” I wondered, what are the concerns of God? What could He, the owner of the cattle on a thousand hills (not to mention the rest of creation) possibly lack? Or, if you’re not the practical gift type, what could we give Him to make Him happier?

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