31 Days of Packing Party Blessings

31 days from right now we'll be finishing the September 28th Operation Christmas Child youth packing party and on the eve of our regular September 29th packing party.

So tonight I'm starting a countdown of 31 Packing Party Blessings that God has given to provide for these 20,000 simple gifts.

This first one may seem strange because it goes back to spring of 2011 but I'm convinced that without the 2011 Operation Christmas Child Connect Conference there may have been no 2012 packing party in my future.

I arrived at that conference discouraged and so close to quitting on OCC that it's painful to remember.  You can read my post about it here.

Though I didn't hear an audible voice, God spoke to me in clear ways in those few days and used them to encourage me and solidify my call to Operation Christmas Child.   I'm not sure I would have been looking toward this 31-day countdown to the packing party without that conference.

This leads me to the reminder of how many of us are in dry places right this minute.  For all you know, someone in your sphere of influence today might be in that place of discouragement.  You could bring the word that will keep that person going so he or she can fulfill God's plan.

Say the Word.

Prayed-For Paper

In my last post I established that angels sometimes use US mail.  Well, today I learned they also use pick-up trucks.

I've been praying for months for paper for our Operation Christmas Child shoebox packing party.  We needed 400 reams to be able to put a packet of 10 sheets of paper in each of our 20,000 boxes.

For the past month or so I still needed 180 more reams (18 cases) of paper.  And I've been praying.

About two weeks ago I got a message from a Facebook friend who said her husband's work might be willing to donate paper but he needed to get the donation approved by one more person.  Our prayer team went to work and the prayer request was sent out.

I received joyous news that the request was granted and we'd be getting "18 boxes" of paper.  I didn't really ask specifically if that meant 18 cases and I was afraid to believe that we really had all the needed paper until I actually saw it.

Well, I now believe.

We made arrangements to meet at the storage container at 9:30 this morning and Lorelei and her husband Chuck were a bit early.  "We have more than 18 cases," Chuck said.  "You might not have room for all we brought."

When he unsnapped the cover on the truck bed and I gazed on all those beautiful cases of paper my heart nearly stopped.

Chuck glanced inside the almost-full container and said, "We can take some back if you don't have room for it."

"Oh, no," I replied, "we'll find a place for it.  I'm not letting you take any of this back."  And I wasn't kidding.  We moved things around and my husband showed up just in time to help us load what turned out to be 30 cases of pristine paper into the container.

Chuck blessed us with a testimony of how he views his job as his mission field and we talked of the possibility of inviting his boss to the packing party.  Then we all gathered in the container, laid our hands on those cases of paper, and through my tears I thanked God for answering our prayers for paper and asked Him to prepare the hearts of the children who will receive it to know His love.
I prayed a blessing on Chuck's ministry at his work, too, and Lorelei and I wiped our tears and exchanged hugs before they left.

In the past week God's covered our need for pencils and given us almost twice as much paper as we needed.

Even 30 cases of paper isn't enough to record all His amazing blessings.

An Angel From Colorado

I could get used to finding cartons of gifts for our Operation Christmas Child boxes on my doorstep when I arrive home.

Today it was two cartons from the sister of my online friend in Colorado.  She sent huge boxes that included 63 pencil cases, 25 fashion pencil & eraser sets, 22 packages of pencil top erasers, 47 colorful deluxe pencil sharpeners (these always seem like such a wonderful luxury item to me because I can't afford one for each box), and 576 pencils to top it all off.

Not only that--she also sent a generous gift of cash to help with the shipping costs.  This is something I pray for constantly because Samaritan's Purse asks for a donation of $7.00 per box for shipping and the $11,000 we were able to send last year isn't close to that.

I pray for God to provide for every need of Samaritan's Purse and today's gift was one more step in that provision.

Best of all was the note she sent (pictured above) in which she dedicates her gift in honor of her granddaughter "who will never be in need of a pencil if I can help it."

Another gift from miles away that God used to speak encouragement and love into my heart today.

Beth, I think YOU are an angel.

Blessings From Afar

 Look at the great packages I found today when I got home from school.  Two came from my friend Heather in Iowa and two from my friend Diane and her buddies in Colorado.

I love how God is bringing these blessings to me from across the country for our Operation Christmas Child shoeboxes.

On Monday 10 cartons arrived from Heather in Iowa.  She told me months ago that she'd love to send donations to help with our packing party if we ever found anyone coming through Iowa who could pick them up.  Well, one of our team members made a connection a week ago and last Friday sweet Heather made a two-hour drive from Des Moines to Cedar Rapids to deliver those cartons containing not only toys but 6000 more pencils and a promise of 2000 more to come.

Here are the cartons that came from Heather today with more toys and beautiful socks and tote bags.

And when I opened the cartons from Diane in Colorado, this is what I found--some pristine Beanie Babies and another 1440 pencils.

Speaking of pencils--less than a week ago I lacked 23,000 of them.  Then came Heather's 6000 and Diane's 1440 and another 1700 from Terri.  I also ordered 10,000 pencils online--the cost of half of them was covered by donations made by the children and adults of Hill Memorial United Methodist Church in Bradford, PA who made buying pencils their VBS mission project.

So now, if my count is right, I have over 36,000 of them.  And Heather has another 2000 coming my way.  And I hear there's another box with pencils coming from Colorado in my future.

In just a week God's moved us almost to that goal of 40,000 pencils.

And today my friend Ellen (who was in charge of collecting money and pencils for the VBS I mentioned above) told me she heard that each pencil can provide 35 miles of writing.

This means 40,000 pencils will give 1,400,000 miles of education and communication and joy.

These blessings from afar will go far indeed.

Coming to Know

Being a volunteer Area Coordinator for the Operation Christmas Child ministry in Northwestern PA brings many leadership challenges which I find daunting.
I call this my Operation Christmas Child journey and it truly is a journey.  Sometimes I struggle with knowing the destination.  Will there come a time when my packing of boxes is over?  When will that be?  How will I know?  There are so many children waiting that it seems like there would never be a reason to stop.

And maybe that's true.  But lately I've been hungering to know that I'm definitely following His will--especially in this large endeavor of mounting a community-wide packing party to pack 20,000 gift-filled shoe boxes for needy children around the world.

Several things have come up lately that make me wonder.  Are they just obstacles to overcome or is God trying to push a door closed?  I get confused about things like this a lot, which I partially attribute to my perfectionistic nature.

So yesterday I was reading in Genesis 15 and Abram's desire to know seems to have a strong parallel with mine.

⁶ Abram believed the Lord, and he credited it to him as righteousness.

⁷ He also said to him, “I am the Lord, who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land to take possession of it.”

⁸ But Abram said, “Sovereign Lord, how can I know that I will gain possession of it?”

⁹ So the Lord said to him, “Bring me a heifer, a goat and a ram, each three years old,along with a dove and a young pigeon. ”

¹⁰ Abram brought all these to him, cut them in two and arranged the halves opposite each other; the birds, however, he did not cut in half. ¹¹ Then birds of prey came down on the carcasses, but Abram drove them away.

¹² As the sun was setting, Abram fell into a deep sleep, and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him. ¹³ Then the Lord said to him, “Know for certain that for four hundred years your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own and that they will be enslaved and mistreated there. ¹⁴ But I will punish the nation they serve as slaves, and afterward they will come out with great possessions. ¹⁵ You, however, will go to your ancestors in peace and be buried at a good old age.

In verse 8, Abram wants to know HOW he will know.  Oh, yeah, Abram, I know just how you feel.

So God tells him to get his offering and lay it out, and I feel like that's what we do with our shoebox offerings.  We collect them and we lay them before the Lord.

Then in verse 11 the birds of prey come against that offering and Abram has to spend all his energy protecting it.  Would it be a stretch to say that the discouragements that come our way are a bit like those birds of prey?  I feel like I've been fighting off some vultures lately.

In verse 12, exhausted, Abram falls into a deep sleep and a dreadful darkness (the NAS says 'terror and great darkness fell upon him) which doesn't sound like a very restful sleep at all.  

But after all the struggle and the darkness, THEN he hears God's voice telling him, "Know for certain...." and detailing the promise that will come.  Even though it will come for his descendants after 400 years of more struggle.  Yikes!  Maybe I don't really want to know the promise for the future.  

But I do want to hear God's voice for me in this time.  So I'm going to lay out my offering and I'm going to fight to protect my offering and I'm going to wait to hear Him even out of the terror and darkness.  

Because I want to know for certain....

(To find out more about Operation Christmas Child, go to www.samaritanspurse.org/occ )

Willow Creek Global Leadership Summit--Bill Hybels--Closing Session

Last presentation at the Willow Creek Global Leadership Summit where I've spent the last two days trying to learn some leadership skills for leading my Operation Christmas Child team==

The local church is the hope of the world!

Your participation in this summit is the fulfillment of a 17-year-old vision.  Everyone wins when a leader gets better.  I've never looked on the Summit as a hit or miss affair.  My vision has been that every serious leader would realize we need an annual heart check.  My dream is that every leader would say the Summit is non-negotiable.  I'm going to fix what needs to be fixed so I can someday tell God I did my absolute best.

To my knowledge nothing like this has ever happened in our world.  It's within our grasp.

Matthew 16:18--Jesus said, "I will build my Church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it."  Jesus will not let us fail.

Google of "The local church is the hope of the world." had 251 million hits on google.  A portion of those were in disagreement.  The first 18 years of my life if I'd given a quote about the church it would have been, "hopeless."   Growing up I saw a lifeless church.  I knew I'd only at best be minimally engaged in the church for the rest of my life.   Our church was so hopeless I wanted to protect people from coming to it.

Then from age 18-35 I started feeling more hopeful.  A professor at Trinity College impacted me by talk of a community totally devoted to God who took their meals together and became open and vulnerable with each other.  Bold prayers were prayed.  Signs and wonders were happening.  Dr. B. would say, "Why can't there be such a community of faith in our culture.  In our day.  And why can't someone in this class give up their life plan and set out to building one."  For the first time in my life I was seized by a vision.  Vision propels people forward who would normally be satisfied with the status quo.  People live for vision and more often than not people die for vision.  Without vision, people die.  I got seized with the vision of what the Church could be and I wound up walking away from the script of my life and vowed I would not go to my grave without playing some kind of a role in seeing this vision happen.

I moved to help a friend build a youth group in Park Ridge, IL.  Years ago I wrote a book called "Rediscovering Church" and wrote a chapter called "The Wonder Years" because there were so many signs and wonders in 36 months.  The group grew from 25 to 1000 students.

I taught 15-year-olds how to be filled with the Holy Spirit and how to find their spiritual gifts.  I taught them about the beauty of community.  I taught them about the explosive power of the message of Christianity.

We decided to put an outreach night on the calendar and fasted for that night.  When the night came the room was packed and after the music I laid out the core message of Christianity--saving grace.  God loves you.  About 200 students responded to the message.  I had never seen the power of God transforming lives as I did in that moment.  We counseled students until well after midnight and when I locked up the church my knees buckled and I said to God, "I'll keep doing this if You keep doing that."  And God whispered back--there is so much more where that came from.  I struck my covenant with God that night and we were to see so much more.

A few years later we saw the birth of Willow Creek in a movie theater.  Then we saw the purchase of this property as people gave everything and stood in line to take out bank loans.

15 years into the development of Willow Creek I was in an airport and saw two boys about 7 and 9 years old fighting.  He had to leave them to get on the plane and God told him on the plane to think about the future of the little boy throwing the punches.  Think what he'll turn out like.  If he's using fists at age 9 will he be using knives and then guns and end up in jail and hell.  God asked him what could change the trajectory of that child.  Will government pass a law or business create a product that will transform that boy's hate-filled heart?  No.

So the thought came with clarity--the only thing will change the trajectory of that child's life is for some fired-up Christ follower to show God's love to him and chase out the hate in his heart.  A church who will embrace him and invite him into a healing community.  I came to the rock solid conviction that because the power of Jesus Christ is the only thing that can change a human heart....that means the local church is the hope of the world.

The next day I went to work different.  If the local church is the hope of the world, then we have to get Willow Creek to reach its fullest potential.  Each attender matters because they are the church.  Everyone needs to make a maximum contribution.  People need to step up and lead and teach and shepherd and we need to teach everyone to give and serve.

Over time we'll see the darkness give way to the light and love of God.  Will the local church, the hope of the world, be able to sustain itself until the end of time?  Don't answer too quickly.

The hope is Who is sustaining it and protecting it and that is none other than Jesus Himself.  Dr. B. used to say this is the only thing Jesus is doing between now and the end of the earth.

I hope you understand that one of the greatest privileges of life is when Jesus taps you on the shoulder and says, "I have a critical role for you to play and one of the reasons I redeemed you was for you to step into this critical role. I need you.  Will you join me as we build my church?"

If you've ever felt that prompting, for God's sake, how do you say "no"?

Every day we should commit ourselves to God with a "Morning Prayer" of commitment.  What if we prayed this every day and did what God whispered to us to do?

What if the 60,000 leaders who are part of the Global Summit prayed this every day?  The gates of hell would melt away and the church would prevail in ways the world has never witnessed.  I for one am aching to see this and I hope you are as well.

I thought long and hard about how to close the Summit this year and the only consistent whisper I heard from God was to call people to join in the building of the church--the hope of the world.  (Take card with printed Morning Prayer)

Group reading and commitment to The Morning Prayer as follows:

My Morning Prayer

God, this is a new day.  I freshly commit myself to the role you have invited me to play, as you are building your church in this world.  I am awestruck again today that you include me in this grand life-giving, world-transforming, endeavor.  So today I joyfully offer you:

MY LOVE

MY HEART

MY TALENTS

MY ENERGY

MY CREATIVITY

MY FAITHFULNESS

MY RESOURCES

AND MY GRATITUDE

I commit all of myself to the role you have assigned me in the building of your church so that it may thrive in this world.  And I will "bring it" today.  I will bring my best.  You deserve it.  Your church deserves it.  It is the Hope of the World.

Willow Creek Global Leadership Summit--Geoffrey Canada--Changing The Odds

Waiting to hear more about leadership that can make a difference in the world through Operation Christmas Child at the Willow Creek Global Leadership Summit--

Q & A with Geoffrey Canada

--You often use the word contamination to describe your work in Harlem.  Could you define that?
There are many places in our nation that we have allowed to become areas of hopelessness.  Despair rules and young people who grow up there have no way of knowing right from wrong.  They are contaminated with negative values and principles.  We need to counteract this with positive in enough children to make a tipping point.

What you have to do is change the neighborhoods.  You have to go block by block with a strategy for change.  Started with one block in Harlem and then went on and by the third block people began to believe change might be possible.

--So you start with parents during pregnancy and go all the way up?
When you raise a child there is no time that you can't be a good parent.  So you need to start from birth to offer support.

--In addition to the education what else do you offer?
People in my business are okay with education but not on board with medical and other support services.  What decent person would withhold services from children if they can be provided?  This should not be thought of as exceptional.

--We've got many leaders listening around the world.  What is this tipping point?
We think in our communities a culture begins to take place that works against any positive change taking place.  The culture gives negative messages working against the positive messages in education.  The culture needs to be changed so 65-75% of the culture has the same positive values and they can be reinforced in the child.

--You've used the phrase 'against all odds' to describe your life.  What's that about?
He came from the South Bronx where the odds were against you getting out of the neighborhood alive.  Places where young people are considered extraordinary for surviving should be changed to make their odds of success the same as those for all children.

My mother was determined that I would read and be highly educated.  My grandmother decided she was gonna save my soul.  At age 6 or 7 she talked with me about God and she passed away before she knew she had saved my soul.  That woman saved my soul.

--You and your team launched this experiment in Harlem.  What success did you see right away?
Here's one of the problems.  Failure when noone knows who you are can be dealt with quietly.  But when you make a bold vision it's harder to deal with.  We invested time and money and the schools showed poor results in data.   One of the most difficult things is to work really hard and fail publicly.  What you want to do is scale down the vision and not take a chance again.  Admitting failure and promising to try twice as hard to succeed was difficult but we had to do it.

--You had to make some staffing changes. Do you regret not doing that sooner?
It was a mistake.  I wanted to give them another chance.  We sometimes forget who we're actually working for.  We think we're working for the staff instead of the kids.  The kids didn't get a second chance.  The idea I could wait and hope people would get batter was wrong and something I learned the hard way.

--Many of our listeners have faced situations with key donors.  You had donor pressure to change your school philosophy. How did you handle that?
I did not get into this business to make money.  There's a line where the money detracts but it's hard to see how getting money is going to hurt you.  When those who give the money try to assert control you have to stick to your values.  If I had begun to water down the vision it would have destroyed my program.  Sometimes not taking the money is the smartest thing to do.

--How has your leadership style changed?
My compassion has grown as I've understood how complicated this is.  I also feel a stronger sense of urgency.  I think we've lost our way and can't afford to lose another generation.  I don't think we have time to wait.  So I've become more impatient with failure and I believe you have to build an organization that can tackle the tough things and keep moving.  When we want to get something done (like put a rover on Mars) we can do it.  We need to focus on this as our core mission.

--Who will succeed you?
Corporations need to have a succession plan.  I was stuck with this idea of how the work would be carried on.  This institution belongs to the students and they need to have leaders who will have an even better opportunity for success than I.

--You've been pursuing this for a long time.  Surely there must have been times you wanted to quit. What would you say about staying the course?
Through most of my career no one knew who I was.  In those dark times I believe we are only a moment in a path toward what I expect to be victory.  I know that my family came to America as slaves and for hundreds of years they were waiting for things to get better but they kept fighting.  When I think of role models I think of those who got no credit but never gave up.  If you can use that as a way of seeing your struggle, there's something about fighting for the right cause that gives satisfaction.

--How does faith play a role in your life?
Many in his family are ordained.  I grew up in the 60s and lost faith in the church because the church wasn't making a difference in the world around him. It looked like a big con job.  My grandmother taught me a profound lesson about faith.  She said, "It's easy to have faith when everything is going great but the real test of faith is when you're faced with something where only your faith will keep you believing in God." I said I need to step back and look again at this.  I've never lost this sense that we can test it but in the end if you have faith it will pull you through anything.

--What are you last comments?
The thing I worry about it that people are watching us all the time.  This issue of our moral compass is crucial.  You need to be on top of your game.  Why do people wait until they get to be leaders and then decide to fall into moral failure?  Every time a leader falls into failure it hurts all leaders by making people lose trust.