A friend of mine sent me this, and I had to post it!  ENJOY!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCFCeJTEzNU

O God, when I have food, help me to remember the hungry; When I have work, help me to remember the jobless; When I have a home, help me to remember those who have no home at all; When I am without pain, help me to remember those who suffer, And remembering, help me to destroy my complacency; bestir my compassion, and be concerned enough to help; By word and deed, those who cry out for what we take for granted.

Amen.

– Samuel F. Pugh

A professor of mine recently posted this, and I thought it was a nice reminder of what love is and is not…enjoy!

 It was a busy morning, approximately 8:30 am, when an elderly gentleman, in his 80’s, came in to have sutures (stitches) removed from his thumb. He stated that he was in a hurry as he had an appointment at 9:00 am. I took his vital signs and had him take a seat, knowing it would be over an hour before someone would be able to see him. I saw him looking at his watch and decided, since I was not busy with another patient, I would evaluate his wound. On exam it was well healed, so I talked to one of the doctors, got the needed supplies to remove his sutures and re-dress his wound. While taking care of his wound, we began to engage in conversation. I asked him if he had a doctor’s appointment this morning, as he was in such a hurry. The gentleman told me no, that he needed to go to the nursing home to eat breakfast with his wife. I then inquired as to her health. He told me that she had been there for awhile and that she was a victim of Alzheimer Disease. As we talked, and I finished dressing his wound, I asked if she would be worried if he was a bit late. He replied that she no longer knew who he was, that she had not recognized him in five years now. I was surprised, and asked him, “and you’re still going every morning, even though she doesn’t know who you are?” He smiled as he patted my hand and said.. “She doesn’t know me, but I still know who she is.” I had to hold back tears as he left, I had goose bumps on my arms, and thought, “That is the kind of love I want in my life.” True love is neither physical, nor romantic. True love is an acceptance of all that is, has been, will be, and will never be again.

Welcome to the world, our precious gift!

I realize it has been a while since I have blogged…no excuses will you hear…I have just been busy prioritizing the important things in life lately.  Taking care of a newborn and taking care of my family/myself have been on the list of top priorities as of late.

Our beautiful daughter, Sophia Grace Caputo entered the world on August 11, 2009 at 9:56 am.  Some would say she wanted to “back into the world” with her rear end facing first, as she was born an unexpected breech.  Therein lies the undoing of MY original birth plan.

I am constantly amazed at how our plans (the namesake of my blog as well) do not always align with God’s.  That was the premise of why I started this blog–a constant reminder and realization that my life is not about me at all.  I can have all the plans in the world, but if they don’t align with where God wants me to be, then they are pointless!

My husband, Dan, and I had proactively taken all the birth classes and had diligently written our “birth plan” for how we wanted our first child to be born.    However, with the words of the doctor still echoing in my ears (“I think I feel a baby’s butt!”), I was quickly wheeled into the Operating Room of New Hanover Women’s and Children’s Hospital to do an emergency c-section to retrieve our precious blessing.   Just one word, BREECH, had changed the “plan” entirely…

And so it is with life…we have our plans…and God has others.  But in the end, it all works together for our good.  We have a gorgeous little girl, a blessing and a gift straight from Heaven.  And while she may have not entered the world in the way we had planned it, she is here nonetheless.  And as her loving and doting parents, we are and will be, forever grateful!

Recently encoutered this Yahoo article about the city of NY offering the homeless opportunities to go home to where relatives wait with open arms.

It is part of an effort to save the system of New York’s homeless shelter’s about $36K a year per family, but I like the concept of the thoughts behind it.  According to the article, 

“The city, which spends $500,000 a year on the program, employs a local travel agency, Austin Travel, to book one-way tickets for domestic trips. Department of Homeless Services employees do all the planning for international travel.  City officials said there were no limits on where a family can be sent, and families can reject the offer and stay in city shelters. So far, families have been sent to 24 states and 5 continents, most often to Puerto Rico, Florida, Georgia and the Carolinas.”

Here is the article link if you want to check it out:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32197939/ns/us_news-the_new_york_times/?GT1=43001

This concept got me thinking…God offers us the same thing–a one way ticket home, to His heavenly home, where He waits with open arms for each of us…but how many of us will actually take Him up on the offer?

We adopted our two racing greyhounds into what the adoption agency terms their ”forever homes”.  So I ask…do you want a one way ticket to your forever home?  The decision is yours.

I have been reading and re-reading the 2nd chapter of Phillipians very intentionally this week.  The first four verses have really pierced my heart and have been on my mind a lot lately:

¹If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, ²then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose. ³Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. ⁴Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. (NIV)

Several questions have been really eating at me lately…such as:

• How much more could we show the love of Christ if churches worked together instead of arguing among themselves about the best way to do outreach?
• How much more could we enlarge God’s kingdom if we stopped working on selfishly-driven agendas and realized that it is not about US or building our individual churches?
• Why would anyone who is not a Christian want to be one when they see some of the things Christians do to each other, especially when they are considered to be part of a loving “church family”?   People can see when there is lack of unity among the “church body”.  This is not a shining light (spoken of later in the verses of Philippians 2) for anyone who is searching for one.

This video I found recently on YouTube raises the same thoughts I have had about Christian unity.   Forgive me for saying it so bluntly, but here it goes:  I am just over-tired of the various church labels…who needs them?  I mean, really WHO NEEDS THEM to do what God asks of us in the first four verses of Phillipians?  Will your label get you a better place in Heaven’s rankings?  I think not…Christ sees us in two ways:  His or not His…isn’t that enough of a label?

Enjoy the video here–pray and think on it.  HOW will  you respond when someone asks what your religion is or what religion you are?

Unity in Christ

While you are enjoying your pork-based hot dog products this weekend, enjoy this take on our history:

Old Glory Porky Pig

Powerful video and intense lyrics by Matthew West…listen here and let it challenge you today:

This recent news story reminds me of the story of the prodigal son in Luke 15:11-32. 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_rags_to_riches

The 22-year-old rancher was quoted as saying:  “I want to thank the Lord for giving me this opportunity and blessing me with this great fortune. I will not squander it.”

According to the news story, this young man bought $15 worth of lottery tickets to the May 27-30-state drawing at a convenience store in Winner, South Dakota during a trip to buy livestock feed. He will take home a lump sum of $88.5 million after taxes are deducted — an astonishing fortune, even more so in rural Todd County, the nation’s seventh-poorest county in 2007.   

The article goes on to cover past huge lottery winners, painting a tale of those who have won big in the lottery, only to have lost or spent it all on frivolousness, leaving them in a situation far worse than before their winnings.  One man, a 2002 lottery winner, blamed the money for causing his granddaughter’s fatal drug overdose, his divorce, his inability to trust and hundreds of lawsuits filed against him. 

I hope for this young rancher’s sake that he does stick to his acceptance statement, realizing that what he has been given monetarily can become his own blessing or his own curse.

In reaching beyond monetary windfalls, I think of how many things God blesses us with each and every day.  We have inborn talents, abilities, knowledge, and our daily bread.  We have been given 24 hours in each day.  How many times are we guilty of squandering each or any of these?  For those who have been given the gift of salvation through the blood purchase on the cross, how have we been managing that?  Do we keep our fortune to ourselves, or do we share it with others?  It is my prayer that you hold the attitude of this young rancher when it comes to things FAR more important than material wealth.  Those things, in the end, are all that matter.  And God will certainly hold us most accountable for what we have done with what He has blessed us with during our time on this earth!  Don’t squander it!

What are you squandering?

Received this in an email and it got me thinking about a passage in Luke 6:41:

“Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?” (NASB)

A young couple moves into a new neighborhood.
The next morning while they are eating breakfast,
The young woman sees her neighbor hanging the wash outside.
“That laundry is not very clean”, she said.
“She doesn’t know how to wash correctly.
Perhaps she needs better laundry soap.”

Her husband looked on, but remained silent.

Every time her neighbor would hang her wash to dry,
The young woman would make the same comments.

About one month later, the woman was surprised to see a
Nice clean wash on the line and said to her husband:

“Look, she has learned how to wash correctly.
 I wonder who taught her this.”

The husband said, “I got up early this morning and
Cleaned our windows.”
 
And so it is with life. What we see when watching others
Depends on the purity of the window through which we look.

My thoughts:  So many times we are ready to point fingers at others and their grievances when we are just as guilty of our own.  May we look at others through the lens of God’s love and grace instead of human tendencies for condemnation.  Let us worry about our our own “dirty laundry” moreso than that of others…