What does this have to do with Food Rescue?

Probably nothing, but missionary friends of ours in Lebanon sent this letter out this week, and I felt we could all pray for this mans family.  I also have a few thoughts I will share at the end of the note.

Just a short note to ask you all to pray for the church in Beirut and I mean the whole of the Evangelical Community in the capital. Today
(Sunday) one of the brightest young pastors, Raja Nweisser a Jordanian
with the Nazarene Church, died while in the baptismal pool, he was electrocuted somehow when something rolled into the pool while he and a
young girl were in there. They were rushed to hospital, the girl had
made a full recovery but Raja died. He was an amazing man with a lovely
young wife (Seta, who teaches at Louaseh School – where we were for 7
years)) and two little children. He was an amazingly gifted preacher and teacher. Please pray for Seta, the little kids and the rest of the church which
must be shattered by the news. It happened in front of everyone, even
his wife and children. God help them.

There is a song on Frank Bradfords Man in the Wilderness album called Don’t Cry for Tomorrow.  http://frankbradfordmusic.com/ if you want to listen to a few bars.  The lyrics are pretty profound.

I am asking you-you of little faith

Why worry about your life?  I will clothe you, I will cover you.

With flowers of scented white.

I am calling you, in the here and now,

But you’re in another time

Illusions you have made, are robbing your own soul. 

Of pleasures here today.  I see your tear, I feel your need

………I will never leave you, forsake you….never let you go

________________________________________________________________________________________________

I called my family together after reading this email, pondering the thought I have had so often during the last 10 months of Food Rescue that “God is good”.   I know He is, but how is He good to Seta and her children in this instance?  It occurred to me that Raja was probably the type of leader in His family that made sure his family had their eyes on God at all times, in order to know for certain that they would be safe and secure in all circumstances.  I’m not suggesting it makes things easy for them during the most horrific event imaginable in their lives, but I am suggesting he most likely demonstrated a life that lived a calling “in the here and now”.  I doubt he had illusions that robbed his soul, and I suspect He experienced pleasure resting in the arms of God on a daily basis.  It would appear that was evident for all to see.  In the end, by pointing his family to a loving God, he has given them the answer to endure this injustice.  He knew he was not promised anything other than the moment he was living in, and this will be his legacy to his children.

I asked myself, “Am I doing that?”  What person, thing, or possession is so valuable to any one member of my family that losing it, him, or her would alter their view of God’s love,  goodness and mercy.  I suppose there is no real answer to that question, because the intensity of some losses produce tests that pondering loss cannot replicate.  However, I did take the moment tell my children the story, pray for Rajas family, and share with them my belief that God could carry them through this tragedy, and that He would do the same for us if we were ever faced with anything similar. 

If you have children and their ages are appropriate, please consider telling them the story of Raja, and pray for Seta her children.  We do not control if our families will ever have to face a moment like Seta and her children face, but we can control if we pointed our children to the God who can see them through it.

“People are scared to death”

said Bill Stone, chief investment strategist for PNC Wealth Management.

I saw this quote today, and I could not help but ask myself which people he was thinking of.  ALL to Jesus, I surrender…….   Really.  We know God wants our hearts to be willing to give “everything”, but when we see things around us costing “something” we end up being afraid or worrying about a life completely dependent upon God.  Why? 

 When a dog truly loves its’ master and is obedient to its’ master, a leash is not needed.  I love our family dog, and he appears to love me, but when he looks at me with sad eyes, begging to be let go of the leash, indicating I can trust him, I can see into the soul of his “lying eyes” and I don’t let him go.  If I did, we would see his love, respect, and trust are pretty shallow because at the first sign of a distraction he will forget everything he knows and succomb to a million bad habits or instincts that are stronger than his love and respect for me.

The reason why we are afraid to trust God is because we don’t trust Him.  Plain and simple.  We prefer to put our faith in the things that can be taken from us, and then we pout when they don’t sustain us.  (fill in the blank with a pouting example).   Don’t get me wrong, grief is real and not in and of itself displeasing to God, but more often than not it’s overused. 

So let us pray, “Take me off the leash, God”, but only if you mean it.  Remember He can see our lying eyes.

Twin Cities News/Sharing an email

Hi John how are you doing? fine I hope. I am so excited about how things are going right know, pickups are going well, and being dropped off to the places that need the food. I am e-mailing you to let you know that this foodrescue is huge, and I have the privilege to let you know that in my sons elementary school, we are working something out by the end of September that will allow us to give the bread to the parents of the children on thursday after, or before school. This is a neighborhood school that the poverty line is really low in the eastside of St.Paul, so what better way to make sure that families have something to eat.   This is an exciting time right know right this minute and second of what God is doing for our communities, our neighborhoods, and our country to supply of all of the needs for his people, according to his riches, and glory. 

Great thanks to Angela and Lynette in the Twin Cities for tag teaming there to do great things.  Lynette forwarded me two opportunities this week from two new store that were interested in getting involved.  Lynette shared with me that there was going to be a Food Rescue booth at the schools next meeting.  How very cool, and what an incredible opportunity to share God’s abundance in a place where His heart cries out for the injustice found in our schools.

 

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A clean bill of health

Thanks for your prayers everyone.  Carol’s stress test showed she is 100% OK.  Given that good piece of news, I will avoid the temptation to add something profound.

God bless,

A day at the hospital

A little before noon today, my wife Carol came in the door complaining of chest pain, arm pain, nausea, sweat, racing heart-rate, and extreme shakes.  We headed directly to the emergency room, and after running blood work, 2 EKG’s, and monitoring her heart rate, the ER doc suggested moving her to a local heart hospital for observation, although he called it “a gray area”, meaning there was a lot of evidence that nothing was wrong, yet she still had a heart-rate that was about 15 beats above normal.

One day this month, somebody asked me, “are you keeping a journal?”.  He was pointing out that he thought there would come a day in my life that I would want to have a written example of God’s divine Hand during the past 10 months.  All I could say was that the blog was my journal, so in keeping with that thought, I don’t want to forget what I sense God is doing.  As Carol and I had moments alone together today, it is stunning how quickly I forgot what the Lord had done and this new found childlike faith He has given me when pondering issues related to health and cost, both of which are issues related to the future.  Every time I think I have the issue of the future resolved, the Lord allows me to see how far I have to go.

I so easily praise Him for the past and present, yet the future still causes me to stumble sometimes.  Before Carol and I were married, we had many discussions about wanting desperately to be used by God in whatever way He would choose.  Our love for one another grew pretty fast, partly because that was a quality we had prayed for to find in a spouse.  If we had been given the opportunity then to remove all “hard times” in exchange for a lessor opportunity to share Gods’ goodness with the world, neither of us would have made the exchange, yet in the midst of hard times I sometimes fold like a cheap suit. 

I can honestly say that I do not know what tomorrow will bring.  Everything appears fine, and the odds are stacked immensely in her favor that this was an anomaly, which brings the added opportunity to choose to second guess decisions we made today.  Opportunities to shake our fist and say, “why is this happening?”  “Why now?”  If there is nothing wrong, why?  If there is something wrong, why”.  But I am going to use this blog post say thank you God for giving me a wife whose heart He has knitted with mine in every way, a wife who longs only to see Your goodness shine in every way,  and a wife who would never relinquish the opportunity to reveal His strength and goodness for and easy road.

I have spent a good deal of my life as a professional worrier/grinder, but with each passing day God is stripping this part of me away, and it is producing a fresh peace that allows me to say that I am OK with what tomorrow brings, because no matter what it is, He will be there with me.  In the end, He has proven to be all I really need in any circumstance, so the worry and fear of facing bad circumstances is not even logical, let alone real.  They are just bad habits that keep us from resting in the Truth.  I will rest peacefully tonight, not because I know what tomorrow will bring, but because I know Chirst will be there with me, along with His mighty strength, peace, goodness, grace and most of all love.

Bring on Chicago!!!!!!!!!!! Welcome Jeanne De Vita

We have been assigned 2 days already.  Here is the email that came into my box today.  Thanks for praying everyone for a Chapter President in Chicago.   As many of you know, there are many opportunities in Chicago, as this email from Jeanne points out.

Dear Mr. Williamson,

 

I completed the online volunteer application but I thought I would send you an email this way as well to make sure you get it!  I am super enthusiastic about the idea of Food Rescue and hope dearly that you will help me get something started (or refer me to work with people if something is in the works) in the Chicago suburbs–to start!

 

 

I do a TON of volunteer work, primarily working with special needs kids through Clearbrook, a nonprofit here in IL that serves adults and children with special needs–they even have group homes that might benefit from some rescued food!  I also have taken two service trips to Romania to volunteer in a clinic with children in a Failure to Thrive Clinic.  (www.clearbrook.org)

 

My experiences in Romania more than anything have deeply effected my thoughts about America, opportunity and waste.  When you see how scarce things are in a place like Barlad, a small agricultural village in the far southeastern part of the country, it amazes me that through my own hard work here, I can have literally anything I want!  There–no jobs are to be had, many parents leave their school age children to take jobs as domestic or agricultural workers in wealthier european countries.  The children in the clinic eat yogurt that volunteers bring, and after every meal in our “off hours” (breakfast and dinner) we save every single scrap of leftovers to feed the children, the aides at the clinic, even the farm dogs if that’s all that’s left!  So I truly have seen first hand an made a connection with the concepts of need and waste and would LOVE to help change that here in my own hometown.  Living as a volunteer, immersed in a foreign culture especially in an severely economically depressed…. well, I’ve gone on enough!

 

I am single, 35 years old, drive a small SUV and have no problem driving around!  I can commit initially to a pretty rigorous schedule of food rescuing–the families I serve on a weekly basis with the children are very flexible, so depending on the hours the food needs to be picked up, the number of stops and locations, I could committ to making 3-4 weekday trips and Friday, Sat and Sunday every week for a good while.

 I can imagine that with the cost of gas it may be tough to recruit volunteers to drive around, but it can’t hurt to try!  If you think that cost of gas one person spends that offsets the hundreds or thousands of dollars of waste that being prevented, it’s not even a question.  It’s got to be done!

 I work downtown in Chicago but live in the burbs and would prefer at first to work the burbs, since driving and parking and pickups would be much much easier, but I would also be thrilled to help start out a rescue in the city as well.  I can’t believe there isn’t already a huge Chicago chapter!!!  But I hope I can help in some small way make this a reality.

 

THANK YOU for doing the legwork of setting up a working system and providing marketing through craigslist.  I check craigslist several times a week for things going on in the volunteer area in Chicago and mostly see the same old ads to take volunteer vacations–your ad really excited me and touched on an area of our economic lives that I personally feel very strongly about.

 

 I hope to hear from you soon.  MANY MANY thanks for the good work you have done and will do, and with hope that I can be a small part!

 

  Jeanne De Vita

work: 312-822-5228

cell: 773-329-3858

 

jeanne_devita@yahoo.com

2 million $’s of Food Saved and Shared with Others

1000 volunteers.

We are sniffing it folks.  Not quite there, but we added $100,00 retail in a 4 hour period.  We added San Antonio TX, Plattsburgh NY, extra days in Minneapolis/St. Paul (Angela and Lynette are tearing it up there).  It’s just crazy/stupid amazing folks.  The only sadness I feel at times is that all of you that have given so much can’t sit with me and just watch the God of the universe work in the hearts of man.  He opens every door in order for His purposes to be manifested, and He is so only beginning to give each of us the opportunity to share His goodness. 

About to launch are Wisconsin, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Jacksonville FL (Look out for that one) Daytona, Toledo OH, Kansas City, California, and Nebraska.  Dare I say Chicago is showing signs of beginning, but if I told you how much was being thrown away there by one store nobody would believe me.  Pray for a passionate person to take on the enormous waste going on there.

God bless all of you, and thanks as always for everything you do.

Click here to watch Boomers’ Food Rescue!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8D9p9EHbPv4

Click Here for more information about Food Rescue:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QBmqP5mk_Y

NBC Story

“I just started Running”

Before my mother passed away 13 years ago, one of my last memories of her was watching Forrest Gump together with our family, and discussing the wonders of life, how clever the movie was, and how well the movie depicted “childlike faith”.

There is a scene in the movie when Forest says, “One day, for no particular reason, I just started running”.  As with every “simple thing” Forest did, something profound became of it. 

One of the most interesting things regarding being “compelled” when seeking God is that it requires a certain “Gumpish” quality.  I wonder how many great accomplishments and incredible life altering actions have been missed in our world while people wait for “the particular reason”, rather than acting on what compels them?  Even Moses almost missed his calling trying to get an explanation for why God would use someone who was not ”well spoken” to speak for God.   The genesis of greatness often occurs when letting go of the “particular reason” and moving into the mysterious nature of God that produces wonder beyond our imagination.  I thank God for being able to move from the “paralysis of analysis” into the freedom of faith.  

God can do amazing things when we just, “start running”.

1 piece of bread

I had a meeting with one of the founders of the food bank at Third Phase in Indy last week named Betty, and she vividly recalled being in a shelter and having nothing to eat for three days when she was younger.  Her exact quot was ”not even one piece of bread” .   She recalled vowing to do everything in her power and praying that God would give her the ability to make certain that it would not happen to others, which was a seminal moment in her life that led to the establishment of the largest food bank in Hamilton County. 

As she looks around in an evening at Third Phase and sees sometimes thirty bags of bread that weigh forty pounds each that she can give to people in our community, it never crosses her mind that “it’s just bread”.  She knows better.  She remembers a time when she would have given anything for that type of nourishment, and there was none to be found.  Many people in our country are completely unaware how often people find themselves where Betty was when she was younger.  Even I examine very closely each potential delivery to make “judgements” on if it is “worth the time” of a Food Rescue volunteer to sacrifice their time. 

When I shared that with Betty, she looked at me as if I were from outer space, because she knew better.  A sacrificial act that mirrors the way Christ laid down His life for humanity is not always measured by the size of the delivery.  When we have experienced a big delivery the previous month and we find substantially less the subsequent month, we make value judgements that make the assumption the larger delivery was more valuable.   Volunteers are even more likely to become excited and share with others what they are doing when there is a “substantial” amount of food involved by their standards.

In Isaiah, it says if we spend ourselves on behalf of the hungry, that our light will rise in the darkness, and that our night will become like the noonday. 

It’s interesting that the act of”spending ourselves” in obedience to God seems to unloose the phenomenon, rather than the food itself.  The next time we experience a negative thought or disappointment in an amount that we deliver, we should heed the words of Isaiah, and trust that our obedience is sufficient for the Almighty God.

Don’t Sleep Through Your Food Rescue

Sometimes you can use your blog just to have fun!  But seriously, try to plug in your Food Rescue deliveries into your PDA to remind you since it is only once a month service.  Until then, Patty Bukowski has volunteered to send everyone a reminder email the day before your delivery.