I’m sitting here at the dining room table, trying to get
some paperwork done and I HATE it. Yes, HATE. Paperwork is a four-letter word
in my mind. Ewwwww. I just can’t deal with it. So what do I do instead of doing the paperwork I’m supposed
to do? I check my email, and then, oops – I get on FACEBOOK.
That app is like the worst thing that ever happened to me. I
need it to stay connected to the world and to communicate to the world how
we’re doing here in Moz, but man…I waste a lot of hours stalking people,
staring at cute babies and pictures of puppies and reading articles &
recipes of stuff I’ll never make or find the ingredients here to make.
Distracted much?!
I think it’s easy to be distracted when you don’t want to
face reality. I don’t LIKE doing paperwork, but it MUST be done or there are
serious consequences, both here in Moz and back in the States. Paperwork is
just something I’ve never liked. I LOVE writing and journaling but actually
filling out forms & answering cookie-cutter questions is so NOT my thing.
But isn’t that SO similar to how this last week has felt? There are things happening
around us that we MUST do but we don’t LIKE doing it, and many of these things are totally out of our control. Ugh.
Prime example: Cooking dinner. (YOU totally thought I was going
to say something that rhymes with “Shmesidential Shmelection,” didn’t you?!)
When you’re EXHAUSTED and it’s really HOT like it is here, turning on the oven
just doesn’t seem right. But if you have a tribe of hungry ones on the verge of
melt down mode, you light that stove and get to cooking, right? Well, at
least I do because there’s no Pizza Hut around here!
I guess my point is this: there will always be things we
don’t like and we don’t want to deal with. There will be times when we all feel
frustrated, tired of waiting and tired of the crap that goes on in this world.
There’s a lot that we cannot control, and that can be one of the most frustrating parts of a difficult season.
Recently, we’ve been experiencing a lot of things that are
not in our control, but directly affect us. We’ve had a lot of construction
materials stolen and with the exchange rate being very high, the cost of replacing
these items is outrageous - three to four times what we paid for the same item
only a few months ago.
We’ve had some things taken right in front of our eyes, even
when we thought we were being very vigilant. We have a team of builders who
live on site, and there is still theft, almost daily. It’s something we can’t
really control because there’s no way we can see everything that goes on until
we are able to move in and be around the house ALL the time.
WAITING is also something neither of us deal well with and
we’ve been waiting for almost a MONTH for the social action office to come and
do a quick inspection. It’s not really even a REAL inspection – it’s more of a
formality. But every 4-5 days, the director makes an appointment with us and
then can’t make it or doesn’t show up. In his defense, the guy is SO busy and I
feel for him, but waiting is difficult and annoying! I guess we’re learning
patience.
So even though we’re mostly ready to move in - most likely by the end of the week, we have to
wait on the social action office. And we’ll continue to wait, expecting to hear
from them soon, knowing that we’ll get there. This is one of those things we
don’t like to do, we don’t want to do, but we have to wait. Sometimes the
reason we WAIT is because we’re being protected from something or we’re being
propelled into something better than if we had JUMPED immediately and rushed
through the process so we can have what we want, NOW.
In this time of waiting, we’ve had the ability to spend time
doing what we LOVE – spending time with PEOPLE - with our construction team and with our
neighbors. We’re taking this interim time to seek out anything we’ve been missing
out on during our season of business and building. And it’s good, guys.
After this crazy week, take some time to WAIT. Sit back and
look around you and look for those things that you might be missing when you’re
too busy or too tired to see them.
Do me a favor – WRITE THIS DOWN! Take some time and log out
of social media, shut down your email (after you read this!) and then listen.
What have you been missing out on what you need to do or want to do? Write down
something that you need to do during those seasons of waiting or frustration, especially if you're currently in one of these. Go see your
neighbor, call someone you haven't talked to in a while, cook a meal for a friend,
take your wife out for a glass of wine, make your hubby breakfast in bed. Then
just chat – don’t talk about politics or what’s going wrong in this world. Just
show some love and you’d be surprised how much hope you have when you’re
finished.
Speaking of HOPE – help give our community HOPE by making a contribution to Heart for the Needy on Giving Tuesday, coming up in just
2 ½ short weeks! Learn more about Giving Tuesday HERE. If you haven’t already
partnered with us, now is THE time! Help us finish preparing for the kiddos we will
bring in and help us get a jump on our funding needs for 2017. You can give any time at www.heartfortheneedy.org, via PayPal!
AND – don’t forget every donation is TAX DEDUCTIBLE! Do some
end-of-the-year giving AND get that tax deduction – we all win!
We are in this waiting season for only a short time, and we
love that you are walking alongside us, cheering us on. Often times, your
encouragement and prayers are what remind us to keep going. It’s not always
easy and we won’t pretend that it is. But we know that we have so many of you
fighting for us, and we are overwhelmed
by your love. Please don’t stop loving
us – we can’t do this without you.
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