One Bag at a Time

"...I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you. "

~ Matthew 17:20 ~

Four years ago my husband, Ben, & I prayerfully sold our 1st house to buy the house we now live in. We had agreed with the buyers to rent the old house for 3 weeks while we made some immediate and needed work on our new house.  The night of the closing my mom came over to stay with our kids after bedtime, and Ben & I went to see our new and empty house.  We walked through every room, practically speechless.  We were both surprisingly tempted to feel overwhelmed by the same thought: “Oh, no. There’s more to do than we thought.”

Our last stop was the bathroom.  There, my husband took my hand, and prayed, “I don’t know how it’s going to get done, Lord, but we ask You to help us.  Thank you for what You have given to us.”  We were never the same.  That moment began, what we consider, a spiritual revival in our lives. We have sometimes wondered if we made a mistake, but the reality is that through our difficulties, and even mistakes, God has become so much more real to us.  I can’t imagine knowing Him without having met Him through our move to a house with a lot of work to be done, a vision for what to do, yet seemingly a lack of resources to get it done.

Our latest experience is an example of one of those moments when Ben & I met our Creator God through work needing to be done at our house…

One of the reasons we fell in love with our house is the property it sits on.  It’s a little more than ½ an acre, and has several beautifully-mature trees and plants in both the front and back yards.  Looking out my kitchen window into my backyard is an enjoyable experience, as I am able to appreciate the landscape. 

Part of the beauty is defined in the fall.  By mid-November our backyard is a 1-inch-thick carpet of multi-colored leaves.  In the past, we’ve found a way to hire landscapers to rid the yard of its fallen leaves.  For 3 years, every fall we’ve watched 3 to 4 men with professional leaf-blowers; spend 5 to 6 hours gathering the leaves into thierdump truck.  This witness confirmed that Ben was unable to clean the yard on his own.

This fall’s leafy carpet was no different than those of the past.  Early-on, Ben decided he would get the leaves raked and bagged on his own.  An unexpected schedule-change occurred in mid-October, forcing his attention to another area of our house.  As we neared mid-November, an anxious feeling began to grow inside me.  I knew we had to get these leaves off our property before the 16th, or an unexpected storm could come and freeze our chances of getting our yard clean until the spring.

Ben called a couple landscapers, but did not receive any responses.  It was now the 11th, and I knew I needed to get the job started.  I asked my father for some help for an afternoon.  Together with my 3 kids, we went out into the yard and started raking and bagging leaves.  By the end of the 1st day, we had five 30 lb.-bags done in just over an hour.  I decided I’d buy more bags and bag more leaves the next day, thinking it would lower our expense to the landscapers.  To my surprise,  although we hadn’t received any responses from Ben's phone calls, two days later we had bagged 19 bags of leaves!  I realized this job wasn’t so difficult after all!  Looking back, at some unknown point, my perspective went from: "mountainous task ahead" to “just fill this bag, and then we’ll start the next bag.”  With this new attitude, 19 bags were filled within a total of 5 hours over several days!

We’d still have another 25 to 30 bags to go before the raking was done, but a lesson had been learned: be it a house that needs repair; a yard layered with a carpet of leaves; or raising our children, God doesn’t challenge us to look at the mountain and move it.  His Word says that a mustard-seed-sized faith is able to move it.  He calls us to be willing to take on the task - one moment at a time - promising to equip us, guide us, and be ever-present in our time of need.  It is with this attitude that we can face a challenge with our focus, our vision, on Christ.  This opens the door to His working in our lives, and even gives God the opportunity to use us in what He intends to do in the lives of those around us.

88 Displaced Burmese Orphans in Thailand Need Help

A blue tarp is what 88 Burmese orphans have called home for two weeks now. Before these tarps, they lived in bamboo huts at the edge of the river that separates Burma from Thailand. Two and a half weeks ago the Burmese Army attacked their small camp, forcing the children to disperse; leaving with only the clothes on their backs. Some swam across the river into northern Thailand, and others helped each other across in small boats in order to find safety. These displaced children (not official refugees due to lack of legal paperwork) are caught in a civil war between the Burmese military junta, and the Karen National Union (KNU), who has sought independence from the Burmese military government for over 60 years.

These orphans are Karen villagers, many of whom have witnessed unimaginable horrors, including the murder of their own parents. The attack on their camp was one of many attacks on the Karen people as part of the continued genocide in Burma. ‘The Times’ of South Africa reported last Wednesday that the Burmese army and a pro-government militia called the Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), attacked the border area between Burma and Thailand in a final push to destroy the KNU and their families.

Unfortunately, these 88 orphans are a part of a greater group of more than 4,000 Burmese villagers that have fled into Thailand in the last several weeks. Altogether, they form a part of one of the largest refugee movements into Thailand in recent years, and add to the approximately 100,000 Burmese refugees currently living in Thai refugee camps.

With so many people that need help, what makes this group of children special? These 88 orphans were identified out of displacement camps while still living in Burma. In an effort to make a more definite difference, earlier this year, local Thai missionaries focused their attention to orphaned Karen children. They found the children; built bamboo huts for them at the edge of the river at their own expense; and provided them with food, clothing and toys. The missionaries arranged this while trying to figure out how to help them with more than just the ability to survive.

It was in the midst of this effort that the orphans’ camp was attacked. After hearing the news, immediately, the missionaries set out to find their displaced orphans. Thankfully, every one was found! The problem they now face is not just lack of adequate shelter and supplies, but now the DKBA has convinced the Thai government to return the orphans to Burma by Wednesday of this week. The children are terrified, knowing that they would return to likely face the extinction of their people, as well as themselves.

As of right now, the missionaries who rescued them are desperately seeking help from the United Nations, as well as any other organization who is willing to help keep these 88 orphans in Thailand. Time is of the essence…


The above is the news release I wrote last night, with the purpose of sending it to major news sources in the U.S. today. Since writing it, however, new developments have occurred, that can only testify to the hand of God in the world, despite the chaos we are sometimes grieved to witness.

A friend of mine, who actually visited these camps in late May, received word this afternoon that the above mentioned missionaries had a successful meeting with U.N. officials this morning (our time), in which the safety of these 88 Burmese children was guaranteed!! Praise the Lord! I am not free to go into the details, but “chance” meetings, phone calls, etc. occurred that re-routed the fate of these orphans. Who but Author God is able to do such a thing?!

I am posting this experience on my blog because I want to share about the lesson I’ve learned through the privilege of having been minutely involved in this situation throughout these last few weeks. When my friend first called me with the prayer request for the lives of these missing orphans, my mind immediately searched for a way to help. Even as I came up with ideas, I was surprised to find new perspectives about the people I know. I began to recognize aspects of their experiences that could bring aid to this dire situation.

What’s even more interesting is that I learned that we often limit God’s ability to work through us, by not taking a moment to look at the need of the person God has brought into our lives. I know; life is busy. Mine and my friend’s lives are busy, too. As such, we’ve had to ask the Lord to give us a balance between our passion to help, and our primary purpose and commitments to our families. What a struggle it has been! In the end, I have learned to see beyond the surface of an issue, and encourage myself and others past our immediate field of vision, to see that through our God-given experiences He has placed more tools in our tool boxes than we realize.

This has been an extraordinary experience! I look forward to “seeing” these children grow up, and pray that the Lord will use them to make a difference in their own war-torn country.