Kenya Trip in March

Dear Friends and Family,

   Did you know that in Kenya alone there are currently 2 million orphans out of the 12 million children?  And 700 children a day become orphaned in Kenya – 1 every 2 minutes!  As you know God has given Ryan and I a heart for orphans.  We are active foster parents, adoptive parents, and advocates for foster care and adoption amongst our circle of influence.  

  Recently I have been presented with an opportunity to go to Kenya over my spring break (March 10-20) to work in an orphanage that is just starting to welcome children.  This orphanage is called Naomi’s Village and is located in near Nairobi, Kenya.  I will be traveling with an organization called Lost Orphans International (LOI).  We will stay at Naomi’s Village during our trip and work on various projects.  I am hoping to spend lots of time loving on these children, but I’m sure there will be some manual labor involved as well! 

  I would love for you to be a part of my support team.  You can contribute financially to my trip by making a donation of $25, $50, $100 or more.  My total expenses will be around $2000.  The first deadline for money to be raised is coming up next week (Jan. 23^rd).  If you are able to contribute you can send the donation directly to LOI (with Kayla North – Kenya in the memo line) or I am glad to come pick up checks if you are local.  

                        Lost Orphans International

PO Box 1388

                        McKinney, TX 75070

I would also love for you to pray for me and my team while we are in Kenya.  If you would like to receive email updates and specific prayer requests please send an email to kayla@partnersonline.org  with Kenya Prayer in the subject line.

  Thank you for considering being a part of my support team as I step out in faith and trust God to use me in a powerful way.  Below are websites for Naomi’s Village and Lost Orphans International if you want more information about either of these organizations.

Naomi’s Village - http://naomisvillage.com/

Lost Orphans International - http://www.lostorphans.org/

His,

Kayla North <><

The Therapy of Writing and Emotions, etc.

I’m told that writing is therapeutic so I thought I’d give it a try.

I realize that I am not necessarily the best verbal communicator in the world. I also realize that information is rarely received the way it was intended if the listener filters what they hear through any emotion. So I share what I believe to be absolutely true; emotion is the enemy of logic and reason.

The last boy scout

Hi my name is Ryan and I watch The Bachelor.

Out of the mouths of children...

Our sweet little Tori talking about Jesus.

Funny

This is little Brooklyn

Insane

LA Clippers play-by-play man Ralph Lawler and color analyst Michael Smith were suspended one game because of the following offensive conversation on air last week.

Smith: “Look who’s in.”

Lawler: “Hamed Haddadi. Where’s he from?”

Smith: “He’s the first Iranian to play in the NBA.” (Smith pronounced Iranian as “Eye-ranian,” a pronunciation that offended a viewer who complained.)

Lawler: “There aren’t any Iranian players in the NBA,” repeating Smith’s mispronunciation.

Smith: “He’s the only one.”

Lawler: “He’s from Iran?”

Smith: “I guess so.”

Lawler: “That Iran?”

Smith: “Yes.”

You never know who you might meet

In an odd turn of events I met New York Yankees first baseman Mark Texiera at church this morning.

Control is an Illusion

People fascinate me.

I love going to mass gatherings and watching people. I am equally intrigued by what people do as I am by why people do the things they do. Underlying causes explain so much of human behavior. I also love dealing with people. When God made me he made me relational. It is amazing how people are the sum of their experiences. Our behaviors are shaped by our past.

Why I can't watch Oprah

I was reminded again today why I don't watch Oprah.
I was watching Oprah's earth day special with my wife today and the subject of gardens came up. One of her guests suggested that growing your own vegetables was the "greenest" thing you could do. Oprah agreed. She said that having a garden was one of the best ways to exercise and that there were few things that brought her more joy than tending her garden.
Fast forward two segments.
She doesn't tend her own garden. She has people who do it for her and she loves it when they bring the food in. Nice.
Oh yeah, she didn't know what a compact fluorescent light bulb was. I found her show on earth day to be phony.

Coaching

I believe that coaching is equal parts education, inspiration and manipulation.
Education - teaching someone how to do something.
Inspiration - convincing someone they can do it.
Manipulation - Convincing someone that they can do something they don't think that they can do.

Apples and Onions

Apple Introduces Revolutionary New Laptop With No Keyboard

WIth Liberty and Justice for All

My four year old can recite the Pledge of Allegiance. The last line always gets me. "With Liberty and Justice for All. What if we lived in a world with liberty and justice for all.

Cry Out to Jesus

I was driving home from work last week and instead of listening to sports talk radio I decided to listen to some music. Now I don’t listen to Christian music radio, but I like Third Day. And as I listened to Cry Out to Jesus in my car I was moved.

Here are the lyrics for those of you not familiar with the song.

There is hope for the helpless
Rest for the weary
And love for the broken heart
There is grace and forgiveness
Mercy and healing
He’ll meet you wherever you are
Cry out to Jesus, Cry out to Jesus

I started thinking about church while I was driving and how different the world would be if a church was a place where the helpless could find hope and the weary could find rest. Where the broken hearted could be loved. Where grace, forgiveness, mercy and healing where freely given and received. Where people were met wherever they were in life.

Why?

Rudyard Kipling said that who, what, where, when, how and why were his "friends" who taught him everything he ever knew. Any question started with who, what, where, when, how and why cannot be answered by a simple yes or no. They require thought.

If his friends are my friends then my best friend is "why". If you ask most people why they do things a certain way you will inevitably get "I guess we've always done it that way" as an answer. I love to ask people why. Especially when it come to their beliefs and practices.

So much in churches today is tradition passed off as biblical. So much is done out of convenience, yet convenience is only wrong when others do it. Example. Why is the offering taken up as the third element of the Lord's table in some churches? Convenience. This one bothers me. It's like you're paying for your meal at a restaurant. I often wonder what people visiting a church that does that thinks when they see the offering plate come by?

I have always questioned everything. Questions are good, not bad. One of the things I love about the heroes of the New Testament is that they were not afraid of questions.

We're Moving

I 've made two decisions about this blog.

1. post weekly
2. comment on what I know and care about

Having said all of that, this blog is moving to http://www.partnersonline.org/blog. I hope to see you there.

Negative Attention

My wife and I are currently reading Proverbs together at night after we put the kids to bed. We read chapter 27 last night and I had to stop and re-read verse 7.

"He who is full loathes honey, but to the hungry even what is bitter tastes sweet."

The catch 22 of parenting has never been more succinctly stated.

"He who is full loathes honey" helps me understand my daughter, "but to the hungry even what is bitter tastes sweet" helps me with my son.

My daughter has received much love and affection from birth. As a result she is very independent and secure. As I kissed her this morning when I put her into her car seat she proclaimed that she didn't need my kisses as she wiped them from her cheek. - "He who is full loathes honey."

My son, by all accounts, was not the recipient of much love and affection for the first four years of his life. He has since been loved on constantly. He will engage in poor behavior when he is not the center of attention. Sometimes I feel like he tries to fail at certain things. I finally realized something last week. When he does something right or learns something new he is praised. When he does something wrong we work with him and try to help him get it right. The equation in his mind is success = praise BUT failure = attention + interaction. If attention is what he seeks then he knows how to get more of it - "But to the hungry even what is bitter tastes sweet"

My feelings are not hurt when my daughter wipes my kisses off. I rejoice that she is wildly independent. I would not want it any other way. I believe that parenting is not about me but that it is about raising the children that God has blessed us with to be the people He wants them to be.

Faith Restored

An event happened this week that restored my faith in professional sports. But first a little history.

On February 6, 1958 Manchester United's team plane crashed on take-off from Munich. Among the dead that evening were 8 of Manchester's starting 11. Four of those were English internationals. Many felt that England were the favorites for the 1958 World Cup before the crash. Instead it turned into a coming out party for a 17 year old Brazilian named Pele.

The Munich crash is an event that has touched generations of English people and United fans around the world. The 50th anniversary of the crash was commemorated today at the Manchester United game. The club could have milked a very emotional occasion for every possible dollar. But they didn't. There was a minute of silence before the game and Man U played in a 1958 throwback uniform. The cool thing is that there were only 16 uniforms made. Eleven starters and 5 subs. No commemorative ones were made for sale. How refreshing to have a tribute be about the deceased not about the money.

Peace be upon you

AP - KHARTOUM, Sudan - British teacher Gillian Gibbons was convicted of insulting Islam for letting her pupils name a teddy bear Muhammad and sentenced to 15 days in prison and deportation from Sudan, one of her defense lawyers said Thursday. [Click here for full article]

The good news is that she was convicted of a lesser crime. She was initially charged with inciting religious hatred.

How ironic.

Naming a teddy bear Muhammad is hatred, flying a plane into a building is a not.

Missing the Point

The following is by Brian McClaren and Tony Campolo from their book Adventures in Missing the Point: How the Culture-Controlled Church Neutered the Gospel.

I'm in Home Depot. A series of consumer canyons tower menacingly overhead. All I need is a thingamajig. Where is it and who cares? My eyes quickly scan the horizon of stuff looking for a little just-in-time customer service.
I want to scream at those apron-clad folks: Take your eyes of those boxes! Get down off that stupid ladder! Quit visiting with your coworkers! Don't pick up that phone! Pay attention to me!
But it's pointless, and I finally get it: I'm an interruption. An irritation. They'd prefer I wasn't in their building.
They've forgotten why they went into business. It wasn't to count boxes. Or visit each other. Or ignore the customer. They went into business to pay attention to the customer.

The Home Depot story reminds me of the modern church. We sometimes forget why we are in business. We forget that the "Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost." Jesus was and still is all about people. Not buildings or programs or meetings or any of the other things we spend our time on.

Why everyone should watch the Onion News Network

This clip is an example of the ONN's stuff.


In The Know: Is Our Wealth Hurting Africa2019s Feelings?