This has been a most interesting week - marveling at the enormous donations we have received this week. 23 beautiful pillowcase dresses with new matching panties, a large bag of new clothing for toddlers (boys and girls),baby onesies, beautiful handmade dresses and shirts for toddlers (from one of our wonderful chaplains who sews all of these herself), many boxes of food from those Winter Texans heading home, 2 lounge chairs, boxes of miscellaneous stuff for Children's Haven, and 6 large plastic bags of women and men's clothing to be sorted.Our poor Texas room was stuffed - we were supposed to pick up from another awesome donor but had no room to put anything. Not to mention another 8 cases of cheesits. Needless to say we were busy - but a satisfying type of busy. As Winter Texas are still heading home from the parks, I expect we will be just as busy for the next two weeks or so. Every time I open the door I find more bags of donations on our bench outside which was put there for the purpose of leaving donations. Folks don't even knock or ring the doorbell - the things just appear. We were eating supper last night and I heard a noise and thought someone was at the door. A good neighbor just opened the door and put a bag inside! Love the surprises. As many of the items were delivered already, I have started cleaning each area of the Texas room as it empties out - washing walls, pictures, etc. That too, is such a satisfying job - the look and smell of a clean room.
Many of the folks here in the park have been falling down - catching their foot on a step or a crack in the sidewalk, etc. and really injuring themselves. Not to be outdone I was not paying attention one day after getting the mail and took a nosedive onto the the sidewalk. Luckily I did not not break anything - just scraped my elbow and arm - but in the process when I hit the cement, my arm flew into my other arm - yep - I punched myself and now have a saucer size beautiful colored bruised arm! A kindly gentleman tried to help me up, but before he got here, I leaped up (did not know I could move that fast) before too many people saw me - I was not hurt physically, but my pride took a mortal blow! Note to self - keep your mind on what you are doing. Please keep in prayer those folks who fell and broke wrists, legs, ribs etc. One lady cut her little finger off - the doctors are trying to save it, but are not sure if they can.
A beautiful Sunday morning as we went to church - Miss Opal came with us this morning as she was feeling better (she had a cold and did not get to church last week). We attended first service and then Sunday School. As it happens so many times our sermon this morning blended into our Sunday School study. The sermon from Matthew 6:19-21 "Do not lay up for yourself treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal. But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal." Our Sunday School lesson was regarding the 9th and 10th commandments telling us not to covet our neighbor's things. Do you know that the most lucrative business today is storage buildings - if all of the population were to stand in a storage shed, there would be room for again as many people!! Just ponder on that for awhile. Our "stuff" represents idols which come in many forms to distract us from the true God. the god of stuff is the god who makes us forget the true only God. Our favorite memory involves a gift or food. Think about that for awhile. What is you favorite memory?? We all love presents don't we? Why do we buy presents for others on Jesus' birthday?? Stop placing value on something that really has no value. Remember that last gadget you had to have? Are you using it or does it just sit there gathering dust. How many exercise machines are being used as a clothes rack?? Our faith and salvation are our greatest treasures that we cannot lose or that cannot be taken from us. We must sacrifice the god of stuff for the God of heaven and earth.
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