Wrecked

How can I let my heart be "wrecked"--again and again, and moved to action that makes a difference? Somehow I need to learn to remove the clutter of my life, that gets in the way, that bogs down and takes away from most important things.

Do you know--I still haven't followed up on the family of the girl that killed herself in September (mom was dying, a younger brother in Jr high school that probably does not have much emotional support at all)...I looked up some numbers in my phone...I should be able to find them.

Do you know--I have heard rumours of abuse at a junior high school, and in another location (or two) rumours of jr high girls lured into prostitution. I wonder if girls get tricked to come and 'work' at a place right here in town. About these things, as yet, I have done nothing.

Oh sure...I've found some meaningful things to do with my days--help youth walk through their grief, helping a high school girl now figure out how to avoid and what to do about the uncle that wants her to do things he should never ask of her... Guys are hurting, afraid, due to their absent and abusive fathers. A girl wants to hate her mom due to her affair. Yes, for these things, and many more, we are trying to help them find away.

But...there is so much more.

Christ has
No body now on earth but yours;
No hands but yours;
No feet but yours;
Yours are the eyes
Through which is to look out
Christ's compassion to the world;
Yours are the feet
With which he is to go about
Doing good;
Yours are the hands
With which he is to bless now.
--Saint Teresa of Avila
 
Jesus, I repent, again, still
I suppose there will be many more times of repentance
For the foolish ways in which I spend my days
The gifts I throw away
The pain from which I turn away
Lest it too inconvenience my life
Make me Yours
Fully Yours
You, are not okay with these things still happening in our world
I should not be okay with it either
Change me
Open my eyes
Show me the way through
Strengthen me
May my life somehow be spent
That more good
And less of this evil and pain
Exists in my little corner of the planet
The corner You've entrusted me to walk 


Oh you who read this...don't applaud me. Don't say this is fine and grand. Words and passion are nothing without action. God alone knows how much I have really done in comparison to how much I have been given. And don't either tell me that I'm being too hard on myself. This is not condemnation, I am free of that in Jesus Christ (Thank you, Lord!), but rather a calling, an invitation, that connects with what, in the end, I really most want out of life.


(Bill Hybel's message Holy Discontent has many times been an encouragement to "let it wreck" me. Jeff Goins' book Wrecked: When a Broken World Slams into Your Comfortable Life, looks like a good one to gently invite a life of more self-sacrifice.)