The Season of GIVING!!

This year C-Squared (College and Career Ministry) decided to adopt a family. We’ve been talking about doing this for quite some time but we actual took the step and adopted a family this year, through the Don Bosco Center. When I called and told them that we wanted a family of 4 or 5, she was SO excited because she had a family of 5 that still needed to be adopted for the Holidays. Our family is a single parent home with four children. The mom, Julie, is going to school full time and working through a temp agency. There are four children; one girl, Carhmah-Age 3 and three boys; Wallace-Age 6, Wallace-Age 8, and Wallace-age 15. I have been very excited about this but at the same time just a little unsure, since I've never done anything like this before. This past Wednesday for Life Group, Ragen and I were trying to figure out a way for everyone in C-Squared to be involved. We decided that we were going to load up and head to Wal-Mart. I was nervous how everyone would respond, but everyone was SO excited about getting presents for our "family"!!! We all loaded up and headed out to WalMart to find gifts! Everyone was scurrying around the place all excited about trying to find things! It warmed my heart and made me feel so good that people were excited about GIVING to others!! After we finished at WalMart, we headed back to the church and we wrapped the gifts!

Last night, I called Julie (the mom of our "family"). I was nervous at first because I didn't know what to say and I was secretly hoping that it would be a family that would be grateful. I told her who I was and that I was with The Life Church and that we had adopted her family for the Holidays. She instantly was SOOO estatic!!!!!! She kept telling me over and over and over how excited and thankful she was that we adopted them!! She kept telling me that times were just tough and she couldn't do it. I knew from the moment I spoke to her how grateful she was.

I can't explain to you what that did to my heart. It felt so GOOD!!! It felt so amazing that we were helping someone that was in NEED. Sometimes we forget all the real importance in life. It's not about the things we receive but its about helping others. Helping others that have greater needs than ourselves.

I know this is getting to be a long post, but we will be delivering the gifts to Julie's home the first part of next week! Stay tuned!