Kinked

Twisted and blocked, not freely flowing.
God's love expressed as Living Water,
     Poured out for all who thirst.
Jesus is the Ultimate Refreshment!
Quenched only by Him.
I, too, am made in His image and can
     lead the thirsty to drink.
Unkinked, God's love is flowing through me;
     Kinked, I have bitterness and unforgiveness escaping me.
Straighten me out as only You can do.
Make me a wellspring for others to know Your grace and love.

Ohhhhh the simple pleasures of golf!

 I've really begun to enjoy golfing... eventhough I'm a perfectionist and not exceptionally good at it, I have experienced some pleasure playing.  One simple pleasure is not losing too many balls - my first instinct, when I lose a ball is to hunt for it until I find it!  I don't like to give up so easily and "let it go" like my grandfather wants me too.  I'm more apt to give up when I know someone else is waiting to tee off on the same hole.  Another simple pleasure is solid contact... not going left or right, but sailing right down the middle of the fairway.  Yesterday I had experienced that simple pleasure!  The only problem was I threw my back out in the process!  :(  The first two shots off the tee on the second hole were horrible, so much so the balls were officially "lost" and then as I placed the third ball on the tee I thought to myself: "take easily, don't swing too hard, just relax and hit the ball".  Which is exactly what I did!  I must have hit the ball using the "sweet spot" on head of the club because it sailed farther than I'd ever seen it go!  This hole is a par four, so the fairway is quite lenghty and my ball landed just outside the green.  This hole, which normally takes two hits to the green, took me one!  Sweet!  I think I would have been more ecstatic if I wasn't so rigid with pain in my torso!  Needless to say, my day of golfing was abruptly over.

Deep breathing became difficult and painful so I made an appointment with a chiropractor; I was worried I might have slipped a disc or something. So later that morning and the chiro diagnosed me with a muscle strain near my lower ribs (on the right side of my body).  Thankfully my spine wasn't totally out of whack!  He adjusted my T-7 and T-10 vertebrae.  Afterward, Courtney massaged the affected region, trying to losen up that area.  With an icepack on my back and a computer on my lap... here I am blogging!

Today feels much better, but I'm not out of the woods yet.  I'm going to need to take it easy and probably lay off golfing for at least a week!  That's the latest with me...

One particular Egyptian house visit that will leave a lasting impression on me...

The young boy between Risa and I just had surgery.

The boy in the photo to the left has a special place in my heart... when we visited him and his family we learned he just had surgery on his liver.  It's a two hour ride to Cairo (to the doctors and hospital) which is quite the distance when you don't have your own transportation nor is it very reliable when you need to get a ride there.

Back to this young man (I wish I remembered his name)... he is 10 and he recently went in for surgery on his stomach, the doctors found tumors, 17 of them to be exact!  They were only able to remove one during the surgery... then it gets a little fuzzy why they couldn't remove more  (or all for that matter) - it was literally lost in translation.  Maybe his body was too weak to endure a lengthy surgery?  We were told that his fragile body would never be able to endure any more surgeries, so the doctors sent him back home with medication (to help shrink the tumors).  It's unfortunate that the medication he was given makes him sick and takes away his appetite... so he doesn't have any energy to eat and remains weakened.  The grandma went to get something to show us.  She came back with some gauze and began unraveling it.  It was the tumor that the doctors removed.  It was just over an inch and maybe a half long and approximately the circumference of a jolly rancher.

God is so awesome placing Risa and I as the two missionaries that visited this young man, because we could relate to his struggle...

You see, Risa was sick before coming to Egypt.  She was pretty much out of commission for at least the two weeks leading up to the trip and the first couple days of the trip.  She had no appetite and felt nauseous - without any explanation along with some other symptoms.  She did her best to share her story and encourage him to eat even when he didn't "feel" like it because he needs the strength for his body to fight and to heal.  I, on the other hand, related to the surgery-side of his story.  I had surgery on my stomach when I was 3 days old!  I desperately wanted to show him my scar on my belly, but revealing my stomach is a cultural no-no!  So I tried to encourage him and share the healing powers of Jesus with him.  As you can see in the above photograph,  it's a struggle for him to sit there and listen, but I wanted to share how God has the power to change and heal him, like He did me.  Here I am, 30-some-odd years later and thankful for the opportunity to tell a part of the story God gave me with him, in hope that he becomes hopeful and makes the decision to do his part in the healing process.  After we shared our struggles with him and the rest of the family, we were privileged to pray over him and were struck at just how God totally orchestrated this family to be one of our families to visit.  I believe no one else on our team would have been able to personally share and relate in the same way as we did!  I do pray God heals him and he becomes a living testament of God's healing for others!

Relational Intelligence?

So... I've got this new book that I'm beginning to read.  It's called Relational Intelligence by Steve Saccone.  At Catalyst we've started learning what it means to be relationally intelligent in our sphere of influence.  Assad has been doing a great job sharing what he has learned thus far with us and thought we might also benefit from reading the book ourselves since it's packed with a lot of applicable information.  I'm sure I'll be sharing more about this when I dive more into the readings.... I just wanted to share what's new with me.