Getting Ready to Celebrate With a Give Away

On February 13, 2008 I wrote my first blog post. This post I am writing now is my 96th entry. So within the next 12 days I will celebrate my "blogaversary" and my 100th post. There have been a lot of things going around in my brain about how to mark this occasion. Little did I know that 11 days after starting this blog, Don and I would separate. But God knew. He knew how much I would need all of you. What a gift you have been.

I have just finished reading "Crazy Love" by Francis Chan. Amazing book. Life changing book if you'll let it be. He talks about loving God with abandon. Being obsessed with God. He talks about a question that he was once asked, "What are you doing right now that requires faith?" Wow! I have a hard time answering that question. In the next few posts I am sure I will be sharing more of what I have learned from this book but for now I want to share about a man that he talks about, a man with a passion for God and His people.

Nathan Barlow: A medical doctor who chose to utilize his skills in Ethiopia for more than sixty years. Nathan dedicated his life to helping people with mossy foot. Mossy foot is a debilitating condition primarily found in rural districts, on people who work in soil of volcanic origin. It causes swelling and ulcers in the feet and lower legs. The subsequent deformity, swelling, repeated ulcerations, and secondary infections make people with mossy foot social outcasts equivalent to lepers.

I (Francis Chan) met Nathan shortly before he died. His daughter, Sharon Daly, attends my church and brought him to her home from Ethiopia when his health started to fail. After only a few weeks, he couldn't handle being in the States. The people he loved were still in Ethiopia, so his daughter flew him back home so he could spend his last days there.

Once, Nathan got a toothache, the pain of which was so intense that he had to fly away from the mission field to get medical attention. Nathan told the dentist that he didn't ever want to leave the mission field for the sake of his teeth again, so he had the dentist pull out all of his teeth and give him false ones so he wouldn't slow God's work in Ethiopia.

This amazing man was the first to help these outcasts, and he spent his life doing it. Yet he died quietly, without a lot of attention; no one really knew about him. (pgs 150-151, Crazy Love)

So, what does all of this have to do with me and a give away. I've decided that I really want to "give away". Sorry that's it is not to you but I would like to give to the organization that continues to do the work of Nathan Barlow. mossyfoot.com

Here is where you come in. I would like you to comment with a question you want to ask. Any kind of question. Crazy. Deep. Nosey. Anything. I just love questions. (and, yes, I will answer them...I think) For every comment, I will donate a certain amount of money to this organization. God has already told me how much to give per comment and I am going to have that faith that He will provide the money. I have been given so much through this blogging community. It's time for me to give back. The best way is for us to reach out and love with abandon. Crazy Love.