I ran across this great recipe for Roasted Plum Tomato Sauce at Family Balance Sheet and stopped by one of my favorite vegetable ladies last night to pick up some great looking tomatoes in preparation for today's festivities. By festivities I mean I will be cranking up the tunes, cleaning, and trying this new recipe. You know you're jealous.
Something Serious:
Some of the beggar boys that we see every time we leave our house.
I enjoy reading Kristen's blog Rage Against the Minivan from time to time. She has tons of great info and insight into adoption and she shares real life, down-to-earth, and often hilarious stories. She has also been sharing a series of guest posts called "What I Want You To Know" that have been quite enlightening and thought-provoking. You should definitely check those out. Then, this week, she shared about some of the not-so-pretty, nitty-gritty truth about orphans and adoption that frankly, many people don't like to hear/know about. ("Do Orphans Need 'Saving'?") In that post she shares a post by Heather in Haiti. One of my "favorite" (by "favorite" I mean I literally shouted "Amen, Sister!" not that it is a warm-fuzzy, feel-good kinda favorite) quotes from Heather's post is this: "While many American churches are worrying about the lighting on their stage, or fussing over the displays in their foyer, children are suffering in orphanages, groaning...aching...for someone to come redeem their lives." This hits a chord with me for several reasons. I will share a few:
1.) Over the passed probably five years, I have struggled with why the "church" in America (and I am talking ALL of them: each denomination, non-denominational, emergent, big, small, traditional, non-traditional, conservative, liberal, etc.) looks the way it does = not like the New Testament example that we have. The NT church gave sacrificially for one another, helped the poor, took care of the widows and orphans, and were salt and light to those around them and to the ends of the earth. The "church" in America looks nothing like that. What's the deal?
2.) Why does the "church" in America spend so much money on superficial, unimportant stuff? It's seriously sickening after living in a third world country for a year and a half.
3.) (Warning; this is a bit political in nature.) When the health care craziness is going on in America we watched a little to try and keep up with things but again it was something that sickened me. The best argument that I heard for the issue of heath care was that "every person deserves health care." But, the truth is that in comparison to lots of other counties no one in America would actually be denied heath care. If an American (or anyone else for that matter) walked into an American hospital (by the way there would be one a relatively short distance form their house), had no money, and no insurance they would not be turned away. (I have, in fact, had to do this in my early years of marriage.) In contrast the country I live in, if in fact they were able to get to a hospital (because there is most likely none nearby) then they would not be seen if they could not pay. This is why you see people dying of curable things like Malaria, malnutrition, etc. So, if you believe that "everyone deserves health care" then can we start somewhere where they may die without it? And, as far as the very small percent of Americans without helthcare, that do not already qualify for some kind of govt. health care, the "church" should be stepping up to the plate to help them instead of building bigger buildings. (On a side note I am not saying that health care reform is not needed in the US; I just thinking we will realize in several years that this was not the way to get it properly done. Sorry, that's probably as political as I will get on this blog and I am sure that I would never have gotten into this debate if not for having lived in Africa.)
So I realize that none of the things I shared about actually directly talk about orphans, which the post I shared is about, but I think they do hit on the bigger issue: how followers of Christ are not impacting the world for Christ as we were called to do. I hope and pray that this will change as people realize, even in recession, we are blessed in abundance compared to the rest of the world, and that we are called to share our blessings.
This post is definitely inspired in many ways by Radical as well. David Platt does a much more eloquent job on addressing some of these issues.
What are you up to this Saturday? What great posts have you found around blog land this week?
Hope you have a wonderful Saturday!
Linking up to "Share Your Faves" at It's a Blog Party & "Saturday Stumbles" at It's Come to This.
AMEN AMEN and AMEN Sister!!!!
ReplyDelete