meltdown.

I was rushing home from the gym.  Sweaty, holding a ton of junk in my hands and annoyed that my phone was beeping at me.  Didn’t it know I was tired and really wanted a break? It was a text from my Dad and  I can count on one hand the number of times my Dad has texted me.  Not our normal form of talking.

The text read:    DAD:  Are you watching the news? They are in Kenya and it is really bad.

    ME:  No, but I will.  (meanwhile, heart is pounding as my mind whirls through every      possible scenario involving World Racers, Kenya and horrible incidents.)

I drop everything and run to the TV.  In my head I am wondering why our international safety updates this morning didn’t mention any upheaval in Kenya.   All the while I am quickly escalating “really bad in Kenya” to “world racers trapped in collapsed government, or horrific plane crash in Kenya”, or any other of horrendous situations as I flip through the channels.

CBS Nightly News comes into focus and I slowly sink to the floor.  (still sweating and holding all my junk, mind you).    The screen is filled with pictures of starving people waiting in line for food.  Children with forearms the size of my pinky because of malnutrition.  It was terrible.  If you missed the story on the news, watch it here:  CBS NEWS.

Immediately I am relieved because it has nothing to do with a catastrophic, international emergency. Racers are safe and happy and doing ministry in Kenya right now.  In my eyes, really things were fine. Of course people are starving, of course children’s limbs are deformed from malnutrition, or course the refugees are walking miles for clean water.  None of this is new news to me.

It was one of those deep moments of realization that my normal is not the rest of the world’s normal. Those scenes are familiar to me.  They are not familiar to most of the American public.  This is news to most of America.  Unfortunately, not to me.

And here is where the meltdown began.  The meltdown could go multiple ways actually, and I am still not sure which is worse.  

 

                   My mind went here:

**  I should be in Kenya.  I should be doing something.  This is NOT ok.  Children starving is not ok.  I think I will go tonight.  Yes!  I will buy a ticket tonight and go to Kenya.  I am not doing anything worthwhile here and people are starving and I have to go.  

**  How is this so normal to me and the people closest to me, who should have the most access to my life, don’t know of this normal?  Have I not shared enough?  Do I need to do a better job communicating?  What can I do to get other people to see what I have seen?

**  We ARE doing something about this situation in Kenya right now.  Our Kenya Initiative team is there.  They are on the ground, working in camps, loving people, feeding people, building homes for people.  I just put 46 World Racers on a plane to Kenya last Friday from DC.  They are there.  They are being Jesus.  They are bringing hope, food, and life.  Here is a report from them just today:

Team Tuna Moto (Team on Fire in Swahili) needs some prayers for tomorrow. We are going out to big name grocery stores to have them partner with us/the local NGO we are working with, to supply a truck. That truck will be used to transport food to the starving people in northern Kenya. That and we are going to be trying to empower the local people to build relationships and help themselves fight hunger. God is in this place! lovelove Day one at ministries on The World Race .  

Okay – deep breath.  I am not going to Kenya tonight.  I am going to stay right here and continue to send others.  I am going to keep working on websites, marketing plans, logistics, and field care for the 400 people we have on the field right now.

I am also going to do more to communicate.   I am going to share stories of heartbreak and restoration.  Pain and celebration – America needs to see the “normal” that exists outside of FB and our cubicles.

And I am going to pray, encourage, support and love on the people we have in Kenya right now.  Would you join me?  Will you read the blogs on the WR page?  Will you click the link to the Kenya team and drop your hard-earned dollars into the support account that funds their efforts at restoration?  

 

Friends, I promise to you that I will do a better job sharing what is happening in the world.  I want to show you their normal.  I also promise to better show you what WE are doing to help the normal things of the world.  The teams that are traveling, sharing, praying and loving.  I want you to know what we are doing together to make news like that no longer part of their normal.

 

Just today I got word of over 100 healings last week in the bush of Mozambique.  Now THAT is the normal we should be talking about.  As soon as I get the details they are headed your way!