*Please Note*
As of July 2015 many photos have been intentionally removed.

Thursday, September 4, 2014

Africa Is God's Country.....

.....And He can have it! (GM)
He can have it, but I'm going to rent it for about 30 days real soon.
Its been a bizarre time for me since I last posted here. There has been a great deal on my mind and being quiet is not a skill I have mastered, nor am I interested in doing so.
There are many things I could write about retrospectively, since my last post. Some of them funny, some sad. Maybe a few scary or depressing. I'm sure there is even an adventure or two in there. The topic I have chosen for my return has a little bit of all to offer.

Last Mother's Day, I sat in a gathering at LCBC like I do most weekends. Unlike other church environments, LCBC is quite unpredictable. Yet, if you go there long enough you can sometimes tell when their intention is to beat you with an emotional sledgehammer. This was one such morning.
On this particular day, Kris was out of town on business and Aiden had chosen to sit beside me in the main gathering rather than attend his age appropriate haunt. One thing led to another and I can tell there is about to be a beat down, LCBC style. This video shows what followed. Don't chicken out or tell me you don't have time for it! It's seven freakin' minutes and if I had to sit through it....so do you.
Knowing enough about Orthopedic Surgery to be dangerous, it was easy for me to recognize many of
the issues CURE worked with were of an Orthopedic nature.
For several years, my reason (excuse) for walking away from these kinds of presentations was simple. I had no emotional connection to the type of work being done, clinically speaking. But here was something right in my wheel house. Orthopedics. I could not stop crying, and I could not look away.
It was Sunday but I called the office number for Cure anyway, located just outside Harrisburg (go figure). They returned my phone call the same day. A Sunday. A holiday weekend.
From there on out things just kept happening that gave me the green light to travel. Far too many details lined up for this to be a coincidence. The last time I experienced this many green lights was when we moved from NYC to Lancaster PA. Back then, things happened that were not of our doing. Our life took shape in a way we surely could not have manufactured on our own. When these kinds of things happen, you get on board, you don't ask questions. Circumstances spin wonderfully out of control and the right thing to do simply becomes known to you.
There are many more details than I can go into right now. Perhaps I can add to this story as it continues to take shape. I will also fill in some of the blanks that have gotten me to this point. 
I am hopeful that this adventure is merely just the beginning of significant change that points me and my family towards the further pursuit of real value, in this world of so much misdirection.  
My promise is to not say "no".

This is a link to a page CURE has set up for me. From there you can read about the work in Zambia, specifically.  If you are inclined to donate financially or otherwise, you can also do so from this page.
More than anything else, I value conversation about this topic. To that end, kindly pass this information along to people of value in your life so there can be enough dialogue to go around. I fully believe that when good people talk with one another about topics of significance, great things happen.
I don't use Facebook, and I don't understand Twitter, but if you do, feel free to pass this around.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

-You amaze me.

Unknown said...

Anxious to follow you in your journeys. Thankful for your friendship.

BarbaraAnn said...

Glad you're back. I enjoy your blog and look forward to more of your writing in the days, months, and years ahead!! AFRICA!!!!!!!!!