I’ve never felt okay ignoring people who are putting themselves out there for my protection. Several airplane flights ago I gave in tomy unease and started watching the flight attendants during their safety brief. Along the way I began noticing something peculiar…they never make eye contact.

This was confirmed when during a very rare first class flight (I’m usually in coach) I was clearly the only one among the 16 passengers watching. The attendant acted like a husband who wants to make sure his wife knows he is not looking at the attractive girl walking by. He looked in every direction but mine.

NOTE:  For those who have followed this blog I apologize for a delay in posting.  On March 10, 2010 we had a devistating fire that completely threw me off my routine.  I posted the following article on my personal blog days after the fire.  We hope to be fully back to posting articles in the coming weeks.  God Bless.

It began with the emergency call code from Angie to me. [ NOTE: If you don't have one of these I recommend it. When I'm in a meeting or otherwise unavailable at work I press "ignore" when she calls which sends her call immediately to voicemail. She then redials and I know to answer because it's an emergency.] During my Wednesday morning meeting in Austin I answered to hear that our house (in Merkel) was on fire. Considering the situation she was surprisingly calm, frantic yes…but definitely not hysterical. Once the front windows broke and flames with smoke rushed from the house we both knew it was best for Angie to go next door to her parent’s home and wait instead of watch. As she was walking in I could hear through the phone the horns blowing for firefighters to evacuate and let it burn.

The fire department was on the scene within minutes of Angie’s call to 911. We found out later someone passing the house had called earlier so they got a head start. Even with the quick response there was nothing that could be done. Our house burned from a mix of accidental ignition of a heat source warming the dogs and 35 mph (with gusts to 50) winds. Even with seemingly initial success in controlling the blaze, the fire and wind created a blow torch effect that would require more water to extinguish than the two Merkel trucks and seven Abilene trucks could possibly pump. The responders fought until exhausted and made the correct choice to retreat, there wasn’t one thing in the house worth even an injury. Thank you to the Merkel VFD and Abilene FD for their efforts, you just can’t beat nature.

I have thanked God every day for Amie’s presence at our house on that day. She only periodically helps Angie clean the house but without screaming for Angie to come downstairs when she saw the smoke, Angie would have been in the shower on the second floor and endangered at best. I’m thankful Angie didn’t open the door to the back porch where the blaze was raging, the wind would have certainly blown the flames into her and Amie and I would be typing this from the hospital She could have thought she could save the dogs (they got out anyway) or put the fire out with her kitchen extinguisher (too late for that) but she had the presence of mind under pressure to just evacuate.

The community of Merkel is phenomenal…I will certainly write more on this in the coming weeks, we would not be as strong right now without the hundreds of our friends and neighbors who showed up to help.

Service to community and help to fallen comrades are tenets so engrained in the ethos of the Texas Army National Guard that we were almost overwhelmed with support. It took direct orders and a promise of future help to keep these Great Americans away. I will always be grateful to God for the blessing of working with such a great organization.

So we find ourselves at zero. Even with the donations of clothes and essentials from the community we still can fit our earthly possessions into the back of my truck. We have always talked big talk that we don’t put any stock on earthly things but the talk falls flat when we actually lose everything. An inventory runs in our minds of all the things we lost…

It’s not so much the loss of stuff that causes sadness but the loss of the memories connected to the stuff. We are saddened to think of losing Angie’s wedding ring, wedding dress, childhood doll “Susie,” cookbook collection, and high school cheer uniforms (into which she still fit!); Chelsea’s impressive collection of books, cheer and dance gear, senior scrapbook, and American Girl dolls; Chera’s sports medals, cheer gear, scrapbooks, snow globe collection, and artwork; The Bible I carried through combatin Iraq and my Jeep (it’s a jeep thing you wouldn’t understand) [Note: Monkey is safely secured at my parent's house because my mother rightfully decided years ago I wasn't responsible enough to have him yet] .

“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust [and fire] destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust [and fire] do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.” Matthew 6:19-20 (NIV)

On Wednesday night we had a family meeting in our hotel room to discuss the importance of the day. I believe that with every life changing event there WILL BE change. It’s up to us to make it positive. After a family hug we all confirmed that stuff didn’t matter and our memories will survive without the stuff. More importantly, we had each other.

The GREAT thing is we are only at zero in terms of possessions. We are blessed beyond description in so many other ways.

• We still have treasures in heaven by the grace of God through Jesus Christ
• Our family has never been closer and each are stronger
• We live in the greatest community in the world
• I work for an organization dedicated to service to others
• Starting at zero gives us the unique opportunity to rebuild with focus on what’s REALLY important

We are thankful and at peace…Shalowm

Have you ever been on the “outside” of things?  Remember when certain ones were chosen last to be on teams in their childhood?  It was usually the same person all the time.  We all want to belong, sometimes desperately.  How sad it is for those who want to be on the “inside” and are held on the “outside”.  Wouldn’t it be grand if there were a place where who you were didn’t make a bit of difference to those who were there, and there you would be accepted, loved and even adored?  There is!

It’s the family of God, a community of believers, who because of what was done for them, would do anything for you.  People want to be valued – to know they were here for a reason – that is what fellowship is all about – to bestow honor upon those who expect it the least – a community where one is treated and treats others better than any place on earth.

“Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.” I John 4:11 (NIV).

A Child of the King

By Lou David Allen

I stumbled and fell right down,
Silly me, I hate to be a clown.
I was hurt, I knew, really bad,
They all laughed and I was sad.
Mocking, “ You can stand if you try!”
But, all I could do was sit and cry.
So completely embarrassed by it all,
Why did I have to go and fall?
I hung my head in shame,
And thought, “It’s all me to blame.”
Then I heard someone sweetly say,
“Have you hurt yourself, are you O.K.?”
No, it couldn’t possibly be true!
The most popular girl in my school,
Sitting here, by my side,
Unwounding my broken pride.
Afterwards, all agreed she had done me a kindly thing.
But I think more.
I think they had seen a child of the King.

Picture God in your mind…

If you’re like most of the people I’ve asked, you probably thought of some combination of a man in a gray beard floating on a throne in the clouds or a scowling judge glaring down from his judgment bench.  Both are totally wrong.  God has a presence in the world today, and how we see Him will determines how we see ourselves and how we see others.

Before we can establish how to see God today we need to explore how he was seen in the past.  Bible accounts paint a picture of a God who made himself visibly present; initially for His benefit an eventually for ours.

“Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day….”   (Gen 3:8 NIV).  I love to imagine what it was like in the garden of God when He physically walked among and enjoyed the beauty of his creation.   To think about enjoying the presence of my creator in the unsurpassed beauty of his newly created earth is overwhelming to me.

In the garden that day Adam and Eve could not be found because they were hiding from God.  They knew they had disobeyed and were ashamed of themselves and their appearance.   This was the moment that separated us from God, but also set into motion a plan to redeem his creation and reestablish the perfection of His dwelling place. From that moment on God manifested Himself in various forms.