More than carpentry

I try to be a humble person. That's not to say I diminish what I'm good at, I just don't like to make a big deal out of things or draw attention to myself much. In general I feel that even if I'm good at something there's someone out there who's better. Besides, a lot of the things I'm good at aren't really a big deal anyway.

Today I rediscovered that I am not good at carpentry.

We sold a bunch of tools in the last couple of weeks, partly because we have too much stuff and partly because we had some unexpected bills. Today I could have used several of those tools. Not having the table saw, mitre saw, and sanders made putting (or is it puting, I can never remember) the door in much more difficult. To add to the difficulty we decided to make it a double swinging door and our house is old. The frame is an odd size that they don't make doors for so we had to trim a door down, and the frame isn't exactly square so now that it's in it doesn't close right.

The biggest annoyance of the day was working with the hinges. They have pins in two places to help control the double action swinging motion. I'm sure whomever invented them is quite rich now, but those pins totally pissed me off today. #1 Those pins are tiny. I'm not a big guy, so I don't have huge hands, but I could barely get a grasp on those stupid little things. Probably that contributed to my losing three of them. #2 Those pins do not want to stay in the holes they are made for. Twice I heard a pinging sound as pins shot from their designated location and hit something near me. I have no idea what they hit or where they landed. As far as I know they've never actually landed, 'cause I couldn't find them for the life of me.

Kari was my saving grace today. I was totally unhinged (pun intended) dealing with that stupid door. It should have been an hour or two project, but took more like ten and if I'm really honest isn't quite done yet. I find it more frustrating than anything to have no ability to recitfy my situation. When those pins disapppeared and made it seem like I wasn't going to be able to finish at all it pushed me over the edge. Nobody sees me pushed over the edge. I don't get pushed over the edge, but I did today, and it wasn't pretty. One thing after another failed and I felt very helpless and very inadequate. Kari was able to help get replacement pieces (girls always get more help at Home Depot than guys) and gave me the appropriate amount of space to come back to earth from planet I Hate This. She was close enough to show she cared and wanted to help, but far enough to not get hit with any shrapnel. She didn't always get this balance and thankfully its probably only come up two or three other times in the 16 years we've known each other, but she's figured out how to help in the ways she can and let me deal too.

I realized today that I am too self reliant. God gave me a lot of natural talents. (not bragging) I am coordinated enough to be good at most sports without too much effort. I'm fairly musical, enough to enjoy playing it and not have people cover their ears. School was always easy for me, and I never had to study or worry about making grades. Work has been easy too. People like me, mostly, and though I've never had a ton of friends, I've never had any enemies (say any enemies 5 times fast).

The things I don't do are usually because I don't trust God to be there with me. Not that I don't believe He's there, but I want to be able to do it on my own. I had one moment when I worked for PSCC that I decided to trust God to work through me in something that without Him I would be an utter failure. Through a reorg I became the lead recruiter for the school. (I know, me, crazy) Following the change I went on a walk and had a talk with God. I told Him ('cause He was was totally unaware until I mentioned it) that I was not a good recruiter and would not be able to help the school grow. I said that if this is what He wanted me to do He was going to have work miracles for the school to thrive, that He would have to bring people to the school because I wasn't going to be able to.

Two days later I turned in my resignation.

Now I feel like I have a good handle on what God wants me to do. It's a blend. I'm musical, but no one is ever going to pay to hear me sing. With God I think I'm supposed to be leading worship, not just musically but wholistically. It's a mixture of what I like and what God can do beyond me. Without God I would be an American Idol audition joke. With God people will see Him and not hear me.

But I'm afraid of not being able to do it alone. And so I don't pursue opportunity.

This blogging thing...

...it sucks when it makes you realize what you need to do that you've been putting off.

Staff Meeting

Why is that on staff meeting days I always feel like quitting? We spent an hour today watching a video of a guy talking about how to do a better job training, equipping, and mentoring staff to better serve patients. He was entertaining, he was funny, it was a worthwhile presentation. After that we talked about this book, 7 habits of highly effective people. It is a book full of truth about seeking what is important, valuing people, doing the important things and saying no to the unimportant, etc. And during the whole thing, I kept coming back to this:

I don't want to do this. I want to do something that is more significant than helping get kids scheduled for appointments.

That's not to diminish the value of kids getting to their appointments. I think Jesus called to take care of the weak, the poor, the voiceless, the little children. But I'm not helping them find Jesus and the answer he has. I'm helping them take care of their physical ailments. And here's the thing, every single one of them is going to die. Most of them won't die at our hospital, but they're all going to eventually die and I will have done nothing to serve their greater needs. My job actually prohibits me from trying to serve their greater needs. And so even while I help meet their needs now, I feel a great burden to do more all the while I am not allowed to.

I don't want to do this. I want to do something more significant than helping get kids scheduled for appointments that will do nothing to heal them of their most basic disease.

There's another thing that eats at me. We sit around and talk about the economi crisis that America is in and to some extent the world, but no one I know has volunteered to take any sort of a paycut to help out those who are going to be let go because of budget shortfalls.

I haven't either, so maybe I'm a hypocrit.

I don't have any resolution on this, but I feel like maybe this is an opportunity for a lot of people. It's an opportunity for us to place our trust in something more stable than the economy or a paycheck or a government or in our own ability to rake in a little cash. It's an opportunity for the church to show love to the people who are part of it by taking care of those that are suffering. (I don't mean the corporate church as an entity with a budget. I mean the church, the people, who care for their brothers and sisters in the way that Christ cares for us and gave himself up for us.)

What scares me about this economic crisis the most is for the truly poor of this world. As our nation turns more inward and focuses on our dramatic inability to pay for our luxuries there are a LOT of people who live on next to nothing and are dying for it. I think the number is something around 29,000 people who die everyday because of health issues related to hunger.

I'm part of the problem. I have a lot of debt and I feel an obligation to be true to my word when I signed up for that debt by paying for it. I feel handcuffed in my ability to help the people who are truly needy. I'm trying to sell stuff that is extra, pay debt, rid myself of selfish items, and be able to help, but I'm not having a great deal of success. For my birthday I asked my family to give gifts to the needy. My parents did and gave me a brocure about the group that buys children out of slavery, but my brother and sister (who make a lot more than my parents) didn't mention a thing. Should I ask them about it? What would I say?

My first post

I haven't told anyone I'm going to be doing this blog. Frankly I'm pretty insecure about the things I have to say so we'll see if anything comes of it.

One thing I'm sure of though: there has to be more to life than this.