monkeyholics

Originally uploaded by redroofventures

I have no idea who the Monkeyholics are … but, I am sure that they will have the coolest tshirt at their event this weekend. Our client wanted a shirt that would pop and I think we delivered. It has to be some type of cool 4 wheel drive club with monster tires and such. Looks fun no matter what.

I have owned two jeeps in my lifetime, so far (wink wink), and I love the mud. Not a big fan of getting stuck. Here’s a story from my past. My first jeep was a CJ-5. Very short wheelbase, still had that body style from previous military model. We lived in Lufkin, Texas at the time … I was a youth minister … the guys in my youth group loved the red jeep as well. Living in the Pineywoods … lots of logging roads and the such near where we lived. Well, on Saturday morning … off I went exploring some trails, ruts, ravines, etc. I happened upon this cool creek … not too steep … should be a no brainer. I slowly pulled down into the creek at an angle and when I got to the bottom the front wheels began to go up while the back wheels continued to go down when all of a sudden I felt the entire body kind of twist … and pop … I did not have a clutch. Seems the deal that pushes in the pressure plates just popped out. I was stranded. No winch. Nothing. The really bad thing. I was suppose to sing in a wedding that afternoon. I was probably a good 5 miles from anything. (This was pre-cell phone days) and no one knew where I was.

I trekked out of the woods and honestly I can not recall how we got the jeep out and home … I was just trying to get to the wedding. I made it. I am sure some great friends helped in getting my jeep home.

The next weekend at our normal youth meeting my kids presented me with a brand new come-along. (come-along is like a winch you can use by hand) I still have that come-along to this day.

To continue an all ready super long post … I think I would like to try a Suzuki Samauri for a next project. I hear they are pretty fun.

I am moved by music with a lyrical story. I love it. I was reading one of my favorite missionary blogs, The Livesay Weblog. I don’t really know these people and they certainly do not know me … but I do enjoy reading about their lives. I was kicking around in their archives and found a post entitled … The Long Defeat, that referenced a song by Sara Groves … by the same title. As I listen to this song, I knew that this composer had walked the same stretch of ground that I had and seen the same sites.

I will post the lyrics at the bottom … but, one line in the song stabbed me in the heart … and I actually commented “wow”, the first time I ever heard it. “I just can’t fight when I think I’ll win”. That truth is so amazing to me … that someone wrapped up a very complex current dilemma in my life with one line of lyric.  Sometimes it gets so frustrating … living the same thing week in and week out … sometimes not seeing any progress in your situation. No solutions. All you get is … “just keep walking in the light, and trusting God.” But God! I need to know where I am going and what the purpose of all this stuff is … it is too heavy. Just keep moving.

Some may read this and totally not get it or miss get it. If you have ever struggled or suffered … you will. Here are the lyrics … find a mp3 and get a listen. Hope it helps you like it did me. — wg

I have joined the long defeat
That falling set in motion
And all my strength and energy
Are raindrops in the ocean

And i pray for inspiration
And a way i cannot see
It’s too heavy to carry
And impossible to leave
It’s too heavy to carry
And i will never leave

I put this quote on my facebook status this morning after pondering it’s truth for … a while.  “All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another.” The statement was written by Anatole France, a french poet, journalist and novelist. It seems like my life is always changing. For the most part I like change. I like new things, new adventures. But there is a part of the change process that I have never been able to describe until this morning. Mr. France identified for me perfectly. Change has it’s melancholy. Melancholy, the word, has a root in the greek which carries the meaning … sadness, literally “black bile”. How’s that for a word picture? Even though I embrace change in my life … there is always that “reaction” point where you shift from thinking about change … to the actual process. Sometimes circumstances dictate that process … sometimes we voluntarily choose to jump down the rabbit hole.

I look around at a lot of people I know … and I have to confess … it seems they never change. Why, I don’t know. Maybe they resist it or are content. I probably am just a restless soul always feeling I ‘need’ to make a difference in the world around me. When I coached, one of the things I could not stand was to see players just standing around while coaches worked with other players … I would go off on them and yell … “do something, even if it’s wrong, just move.” That just how I feel inside at  times. Sorry guys.

The black bile of change is the dieing process of one idea or part of your life. It is painful … for myself and others around me. We have to remember that every decision that we make causes a chain reaction that effects others. So when change is happening in me … it is also happening with my wife, my kids, with everyone that has close contact with me.  Even if that change is good … there is still a dieing process. I think that is what Christians speak of when they say “I’m praying for a door to open” or “waiting on a door to open” … in essence the black bile of change has crept into their thoughts … and we know that change is now inevitable … and man, we are looking at where “the change” is about to happen. If you are a believer in Christ and the providential hand of God … that is a good thing because you know that God is engineering circumstances to point you in the right direction. If you don’t believe that way … then you are probably making your own way and chalking it up to the winds of fate. Me, I would rather trust in my faith. It has not let me down.

In reading the above to Lori, at this point, she reacted “wow, that’s heavy”. I was put back … really, I don’t think it’s heavy. Honestly, I think it’s refreshing to be able to identify what is happening in me and be able to describe it. Personally it puts a sign on heart saying … I am still in process, come back later and see what happens.

Anyway, embrace change or not … you don’t really have choice … just thought it helpful to know that “Change is inevitable, accept from the vending machine.” (via Robert C. Gallagher).

wg

In praying this morning, this song came to my heart. I keep asking myself and the Lord … “is it just me that wants to go to Haiti? or is this your will? … then I thought, what a stupid thing to ask after the Lord has given us a mandate to care for those who can not help themselves. Here’s a tip … don’t keep asking the Lord a question that He has already answered. I should know that.

If You say go, we will go
If You say wait, we will wait
If You say step out on the water
And they say it can’t be done
We’ll fix our eyes on You and we will come

Your ways are higher than our ways
And the plans that You have laid
Are good and true
If You call us to the fire
You will not withdraw Your hand
We’ll gaze into the flames and look for You

Since my last post, I have to say, that things are frustrating to me. The NGO’s and ministries that I have been TRYING to get in contact with are pretty much dead end streets. They all say (in their tweets and facebook status) we need you to come, we need you … but most that I have contacted or tried to contact … don’t even respond back. I guess they are too busy. So … I am going … even if I have to go Abraham style … just walk. God never said Go … if you can get support, or approval, or partners … so, that is what I am doing.

I am planning my own media trip for March 2010. My team (me, God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit) will be going to Haiti to see  the possibilities of starting a vocational school for the young people of Haiti. I think I know enough people in the tech field that we can establish mission trips to train Haitian young people how to do a myriad of things … from computer repair, to screen printing, to art, to music. Anyway, that’s what I got.

I will be preparing to get things together in the next few weeks. Shots, and all the stuff the CDC says I need to get ready. I hope to partner up with a local pastor in Haiti to help … but, I don’t even have that yet. But it will happen. It will cost about $1,000 the way I count it. Airfare, transport in PaP. Plus I want to help out these missionaries there that need tools for rebuilding. Hammers, saws, general carpentry hand tools … more about that later when they send me their wish list.

I’m going to put up this donation button that you can do if you want through paypal. It would be appreciated … but it’s not a … if you don’t send the money I can’t go thing … cause, I’m going no matter what. Faith is a funny thing like that.

Haiti Relief Trip – Wayne Gooden

It’s Haitian creole for thanks … and yes, it is spelled correctly. I thought it proper to give you some insight into my life today. To most of my friends, you may have felt that my life has been on hold for the past few years after leaving my ministry post. It doesn’t seem like years since we left Deerwood. It seems like minutes … or at best a month or two.  But, it’s true … it has been years since I stood behind a pulpit every week and preached. Our journey certainly has not been idle … and ministry still abounds from us whether we like it or not … why do I say this … because “He who begins a good work in us is faithful to complete it.” We have served in several capacities in local churches … helping where we can, supporting our selves through our tent making endeavor of printing tshirts.

My ‘off the menu’ trek has taken me back to things that I brought before the Lord many, many years ago … one being a MasterLife training conference that Lori and I attended taught by Avery Willis and Henry Blackaby. Wow, was that a weekend. During one of the small group sessions that Avery taught … Lori and I both were struck with a deeper call on our lives to missions. We left the conference … back to our nice church office, nice home, nice family, nice cars … and pretty much dodged the bullet and got by in our hearts by doing some short term work here and there and leading our churches to give more money to missions.

Let me digress here a sec … God is not a tyrant or a big baby … you can serve Him anywhere in a myriad of capacities … and He is not disappointed in you and withholds nothing. The gnawing of obedience is in yourself. God blessed our minsitry and the lives that we had the opportunity to put into was tremendous. But … as my U2 mantra rang in my head and heart … “I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.”

Now, I don’t know what you feel about the providential hand of God, but I see it every day … guiding … not pushing … but funneling me to the inevitable aspects of obedience. The Haiti earthquakes were devastating and the loss of human life is heart breaking. What good could come from that catastrophic disaster? I could not even begin to tell you what God has shown as to the good that will come from these earthquakes.

In recent months Lori and I have felt that our place within the church has been filled with an abundance of young preachers and tremendous worship leaders … that’s what we have done all of our lives. But man … there are some very talented and gutsy guys out there that God is using.  So we began to feel that God wanted us in deeper … to the base level of peoples needs … pre-church, pre-convert … at the hurting level of humanity. With me … it always starts with a dream. I woke up one morning … sat up in bed and said … “water wells” … “I want to learn to drill water wells.” I pretty much can learn anything I put my mind and heart to … and this seemed like a mandate from God … so, it was not an option for me.

The need for clean water in the world is tremendous. Africa needs a millions new wells. That’s just one spot in the world. Haiti needs water. I have no idea where else God may lead me … but, now I am ready. After losing 75lbs, getting healthy, training for marathons, beating my body into submission … I am getting ready for the next big mission. Come on, Wayne … you are 53 … you need to be thinking about retiring. Nah, retirement is for old people. I’m not old.

Jordan Ogden, pastor at Mercy Place in Dallas (my last ministry post), has agreed to allow me to work under the covering of the Mercy Place. For prayer, physical, emotional support as well as a financial clearing house for raising support. We are on our way.  I am in the process now of, as Blackaby puts it … finding out were God is at work and joining Him . I want to get my feet wet in water well drilling. I am praying about several good ministries to get put into my training and learning a great deal on my own.

So, I write this today to my friends, the body of Christ, for support, encouragement, and networking. If God moves you with any hint of someone that could help me at this point … you know me. I will follow it.

that’s it

(oh don’t worry about the tshirt thing … we will keep printing … I even have a dream of training indigenous artisans how to screen print as a vocation)

Experts are saying that Africa as a country will need to drill up to a million boreholes to supply them with enough safe and clean drinking water over the next ten years. Estimates for Ethiopia by itself has been said to need 80,000 boreholes for water wells.

This amount of well drilling will supply the country with safe clean drinking water. Just for Ethiopia alone an investment of a billion dollars is said to have to be raised to pay for this over the next decade.

It’s a sad fact that 6000 African’s die each day through drinking dirty unsafe water. The African people have to walk miles and miles to fetch this water in cans or plastic containers, this water if often unclean and not fit for human consumption, but often there are no alternatives.

The average person in this country probably needs to drink about 2 liters per day to maintain life but In Africa the people will need to drink more because of the extreme temperatures.

In the United Kingdom we have little appreciation for our water supply. Just think about how much water is wasted everyday in our daily routine, for example we can use 8 liters per flush of our toilet system although new w/c’s are only permitted to flush 6 liters and when code 4 building regs comes into to place this will then be reduced to 4 liters, leaving the tap running whilst brushing our teeth can use up to 10 liters of wasted water if you clean your teeth properly i.e. brushing for up to two minutes.

The Environment Agency has stated that as an individual every person in the United Kingdom uses an average of 140 liters per day wow! When was the last time you went to the tap and started trying to consume this amount, the most I can drink is about two liters of water a day and that is in tea.

What’s left from what the average individual in the UK drinks is 138 liters, this is probably used up with toilet flushing; cleaning teeth, car washing, leaking taps, broken mains, etc.This list could be endless.

Imagine if you could save half of this wasted water per day and ship it to Africa in a container ship, this would amount to around 70 liters per person per day and would go a long way to combat Africa’s water shortage.

Another way to help this problem would be to donate say £1 per person per year, just from the Untitled Kingdom alone this will be a figure of £60 Million per year and go along way with supplying Africa with drilling rigs to drill their boreholes and also supply them with the necessary training to be able to drill a water well successfully.

We are just average people, living in our own little world in an affluent society carrying out our busy daily routines. When we get 5 minutes to ourselves just sit back and look at how fortunate we are, then compare our lives to the less fortunate and the needy. The ones that have no taps to turn on, the ones that walk miles and miles a day to fetch water.

Remember always, water is a gift of nature; it is just harder for some people to get than others.

Article Source:

http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Adrian_Dunne

Port-au-Prince, Haiti (CNN) — Ten Americans detained and accused of child trafficking in Haiti after they allegedly tried to bus 33 children into the Dominican Republic insist their effort was an attempt to get the children to a shelter.

But Haiti’s prime minister said Sunday that the group was kidnapping the children.

“From what I know until now, this is a kidnapping case,” Jean-Max Bellerive told CNN. “Who is doing it — I don’t know. What are the real objectives or activities — I don’t know. But that is kidnapping and it is more serious because it’s involving children,” he said.

“The children certainly were not fully willing to go, because in some cases, from what I heard, they were asking for their parents, they wanted to return to their parents.”

U.S. embassy officials visited the Americans over the weekend at a jail near the airport in Port-au-Prince, where they are being detained. They are being treated well and are holding on to their faith, the Americans said.

“We came into Haiti to help those that really had no other source of help,” Laura Silsby, a member of the Idaho-based charity, New Life Children’s Refuge, told CNN on Saturday.

“We are trusting the truth will be revealed and we are praying for that.”

The group of five men and five women said they were trying to move the children to the Dominican Republic in the aftermath of the January 12 earthquake that devastated parts of Haiti, flattening the capital and killing tens of thousands. But a Haitian judge has charged the 10 with child trafficking, they said.

The U.S. Embassy in Port-au-Prince said Sunday that the Americans have been detained for “alleged violations of Haitian laws related to immigration.”

“God is our provider and God gives us strength and comfort,” said Carla Thompson, one group member. “We have our Bibles and we are OK.”

(there is more to this story here)

source: cnn.com http://edition.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/americas/01/31/haiti.border.arrests/index.html

The news is good for Pilot Point who has waited for a state championship since 1981. Now it’s here. I thought this morning … what a memory they have made … something to look back on for years. Lot’s of stories of how it happened and all the circumstances that surrounded it all. Congratulations to players, coaches and parents for the hard work and support that brought you this wonderful victory.

They won this 2A Division 1 title which came in a victory against Kirbyville on Saturday, December 12, 2009. This all amidst the tragedy and homegoing of Henry Davis, the father of Jarman and Willie Davis, the running back and defensive back for Pilot Point. Henry so wanted this to happen … and it did. It brings it all so close to home to our little town. We did a special shirt for Henry earlier in the season with both of his sons names and numbers on it. You just never know.

As the Morning News reports here,

As the clock ran out, the state title and a 15-0 record was officially theirs, the Bearcat players dashed onto the field, embracing each other in the cool night’s mist.

“Once we came out 35-18,” senior wide receiver Tyler McNairy said, “we knew we had it.”

This was the plan for McNairy and the seniors since they were in seventh grade. They knew they had talent, and McNairy said that after last year’s state semifinal loss they had a businesslike desire.

All that showed throughout the playoffs. Before Saturday, Pilot Point had defeated three previously undefeated opponents, one of them by a last-second field goal in the regional championship.

“It’s been one of those storybook seasons,” coach Blake Feldt said.

Yep, storybook season. Lifetime memories.

The New York Times says this is America’s first Twitter Christmas. Retailers are using the social media to guide customers parking to special sales to instant tech support. What a world we live in.

After buying a new navigation system at 6 a.m. on the most frenzied shopping day of the year, Laura S. Kern of Los Angeles could not figure out why it was not giving her traffic updates. She sent a message to Best Buy’s Twitter account and within five minutes not one, but two Best Buy employees responded with fix-it advice.

In Bloomington, Minn., Mall of America used its Twitter page to tell consumers two of its parking areas were at capacity and that their best bet was to park near Ikea.

“It’s one of the greatest emerging communication channels out there,” said Greg Ahearn, senior vice president of marketing and e-commerce for Toys “R” Us. “This is a way people can stay connected with the brand in a way they’ve never been able to before.”

As shoppers jammed the aisles on Friday at a Best Buy store in Arlington Heights, Ill., an employee, Jerry DeFrancisco, went up to a computer kiosk and used his Twitter account to tell customers about Best Buy’s home theater deals. Then he resumed his in-store duties, helping a customer decipher a sales circular.

Of course, sometimes retailers simply use their Twitter posts to capture the spirit of the season. At 3:30 Thursday morning, an employee posted seven words on the Macy’s Twitter page, about a marching band that was practicing hours before the chain’s Thanksgiving day parade.

It said: “Is he really running with a tuba?”

Source: The New York Times

This report hits home with me. Growing up in a multigenerational situation (my grandparents raised me), I know the challenges that face today’s youth dealing with grandparents as their main caregivers. There are some positives, but sometimes there are very weighty issues that grandparents just do not deal with.

This surprising tread shows that the nuclear family is losing ground to multigenerational living. More people are choosing to move themselves and their children in with Mom and Dad, often to cut costs. This article found at advergirl.com is based on a survey reported here. Advergirl writes:

These households are fundamentally different than those of the care-giving Oreo Generation. In 62% of these multigenerational cases it’s the adult children who are moving back with their parents, who are the grandparents. Three-fifths of these grandparents are providing some sort of financial assistance to their fully-grown children.

Three larger trends are making this an increasingly popular choice:

* Grandparents are doing better than most financially. That’s because 55% of grandparents do not carry a mortgage, and grandparents control more than half of the country’s wealth. So while grandparents have certainly taken a hit in this economy along with everyone else, they are, in many cases, more solvent than their young married children with young children.

* Grandparents are investing in their grandchildren. According to our recent national study, The Grandparent Economy, grandparents are spending about $32 billion on their grandchildren’s education, $11 billion on clothes for the kids, $6 billion on toys, and nearly $700 million on diapers.

* Decision-making is increasingly multi-generational. Whether it’s what first car to buy, where to go to college, or who to choose for insurance, grandparent’s are increasingly part of the decision making, both with their children and their grandchildren.

This trend not only provides more financial stability for the children and grandchildren, it appears to have rewards for the grandparents as well. Many grandparents say not only that they love having their family back under their roof; they also love being needed again. They say it brings purpose to their days, and meaning to their lives. The physical demand of keeping up with the kids makes them feel younger; outdoor play burns off both calories and tension; and helping with homework provides mental stimulation.

Sources: The new influencers: Grandparents weigh in and Multigenerational Households on Rise