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if your mad, put a monocle on it.

June 17, 2013 by aboutproximity

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Summer Break + Kids = Dunder Mifflin Paper Explosion.

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Here is a “mad book” Ellie made for us this summer. If we get mad we can draw whatever we want in this journal. Whatever… but she did have a suggestion. The suggestion is to draw a monocle on one of the puppies on each page. Yes reasonable, if you are mad draw a monocle on a puppy.

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If you like then you wanna put a ring on it…

If your mad then you wanna put a monocle on it…

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We also have a Judy Moody Not Bummer Summer Chart… to be exact

An Ellie Van Engen Mega Rare Not Bummer Summer Chart.

 

I took a Spiderman quiz the other day.

With SpiderMan’s great power comes what? 

a. danger         b. great responsibility    c. being famous

 

For some reason this coloring book quiz question struck me.

Great responsibility.

We have a great responsibility to be all that God asks us to be.

To whom much is given, much is required.

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We were given a great responsibility because God designed us to be more.

I think we were gifted great power when we stepped into the grace of Christ.

Let’s pray each day to take up that power with the reverence of great responsibility.

Whether that means parenting to our fullest for the day given us, working at our jobs or placing ourselves in the proximity of renewal where we can make a difference.

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For the days that great responsibility leads to mad, just put a monocle on it and move forward.

What are you going to draw a monocle on today? I’m drawing mine over the paper explosion that is my house! 

Posted in Encouragement | Tagged , , , , , , , | 9 Comments »

Unfinished

June 14, 2013 by aboutproximity

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Richard Stearns, President of World Vision has a new book called Unfinished Believing is only the Beginning. 

About Proximity was given a hard cover copy to review and giveaway!

Stearns first book was the National Bestseller The Hole in our Gospel. In that book he spoke about his journey from CEO of Parker Brothers Games and Lenox, Inc to World Vision.

 

In Unfinished, Stearns writes about our Biblical mission to proclaim God’s truths and act on his life-changing love.

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The book lacked the deep story telling Stearns included in his first book. He spent much of the chapters giving overview to the bigger story found in the Bible. I still enjoyed the book and its message very much. The stories he tells of his work with World Vision and other people’s acts of love are the strongest parts of the book.

One story stands out against the backdrop of the book for me. He told of how tourists vacationing at Haiti ocean resort locations are placed on buses with blacked out windows when they arrive at the airport. Then, they are transported to their destination. The windows are blacked out so they do not see the abject poverty they are passing by on the way to their resort.

 

The work is unfinished.

How often when we are not in direct proximity to suffering, do we black out what we see.

We were made for so much more.

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You have a critical role to play.

We need to cast off our inward, secure, isolated lives and look outward.

The book has a great study guide and an act,pray, influence and give guide.

 

Leave a comment and be entered to win a hard cover copy of the book! 

Are you ever tempted to black out what you know? What do you think when you read the words we were made for so much more?

Posted in Book Review | Tagged , , , , , , , | 8 Comments »

Over at Bible Dude

June 13, 2013 by aboutproximity

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I’m filling in for my sweet friend Amy Sullivan at Bible Dude today.

 

Come on over and talk about our God of second chances here.

We all learned we are not so different, all these lives moving together in grace.

Posted in Links to Guest Articles, Serve | Tagged | Leave a Comment »

Hope

June 12, 2013 by aboutproximity

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This post is for my friend Leese.

I meet her through writing. Now, I get these beautiful emails full of all the perfect encouragement. The really amazing thing is that we share a name! Every time I see her name, I smile because it is my name before I got married.

Leese struggles with health problems that would probably undo a lesser person. Yet she writes and encourages with an unmatched fervor. She has traveled all over the world which I find endlessly fascinating. Check out the title of her blog…

God has no problems… only plans. If you knew all that she has gone through, that title is even more striking. She is a proximity sister, a like-minded woman and someone who God is surely using in strong and amazing ways. She is faithful even in the midst of trying times. I am really so thankful for her example. Read her over at {in}courage too, This Round World. 

 

In my equidistant disquietude mood, I cleaned out school papers yesterday. When I came upon this again…

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This was Josiah’s drawing of me from school for Mother’s Day. (My hair is not attached to my head and I have dots all over my face.) I helped the students make these one morning when I was volunteering at school. We are a “V” last name, so I didn’t get to Josiah. I knew the outcome could be bad, but I had no idea…

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The one redeeming thing about this is that he thinks I’m 22 years old.

She likes to…. lay down!  Oh, my worst nightmare. My favorite thing to do is lay down! I’m also good at making noodles (which are out of a cardboard box that I boil for 10 minutes.)

All I could I think was, really I kind of take things too seriously sometimes, and I smiled really big. I think I will keep this picture on my desk. God gave us the ability to smile, to laugh, to accept the unknown.

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Every day Leese looks at her life, full of uncertainty and questions and chooses to believe that God has no problems… only plans. This is hope at its finest.

The truth is all we see is dimly. He’s got the world unfurled in front of himself. I am thinking its an extraordinary masterpiece, just like Josiah’s portrait that I can tell he worked on so carefully.

Who are we to contest the details?

We have no idea what our fragments will contribute to the greater work of art. I have a feeling the purpose of our fragments will render us speechless… then turn to an eternity of praise.

What do you think? 

Posted in Encouragement | Tagged , , | 11 Comments »

Equidistant Disquietude.

June 10, 2013 by aboutproximity

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Equidistant Disquietude.

I like the way different words combine together can give clear picture into your heart.

The thesaurus is an exciting place for me to visit, nerdy I know.

 

I am feeling equidistant disquietude right now.

Equidistant means equally distant. I am feeling equally distant disquietude.

 

Another school year has found completion. My kids are with me now. I have to admit that I really love that time, but I also feel fragmented. Though that has been the case this year it protrudes even more during the summer; am I reading books or writing an article? Do I play tennis when they ask or do I revise a chapter of my manuscript?  I want to be a good Mom, but I also don’t want to overdo my presence when they are learning independence.

How do you all balance this? The roles we play as wife, Mom, daughter, sister, aunt, friend, career, servant of Christ?

Sometimes it all feels equally distant to me, like I am doing everything, but only half good. This is where the disquietude and guilt seep into my thoughts.

 

My senior year in high school, I found disappointment. Around the time we graduated, a close friend told me that I had changed a lot that year. How so, I asked? Worried in my people pleasing ways that somehow it had been a bad change. Just in your disappointment, you have grown deeper. 

Yes, my friend was right. Somehow the disquietude had deepened who I was.

Now, when I feel that disquietude and equidistant feeling I remember the word deep.

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I remember deep in the context of digging deep. I need to go someplace deep inside me that is hard to access sometimes.

That place where you put others before yourself again and again, in faith that God sees. Not to be re-payed, but to remain faithful. A place that no matter how fragmented you feel in your roles, one thing remains the strongest your faithfulness to those who love you and your love for God. This place where you kneel.  This place is the most important place to be.

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Do you know that place that is hard to get to sometimes? How do you get there? How do you balance on the tightrope of life? 

Posted in Encouragement | Tagged , , , , , , | 12 Comments »

Super Power Nutrition!

June 7, 2013 by aboutproximity

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About Proximity is earning a Super Cape in the kitchen today!

Global Team of 200 is bringing awareness to Save the Children’s Food for Thought Report. When you place yourself in the proximity of your own children, grandchildren, nieces or nephews, I can’t imagine them suffering from chronic malnutrition. This is a topic no one would want a parent to suffer through.

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World Leaders will meet June 8th for the Nutrition for Growth Summit in London.

Lacking basic nutrition not only stunts children’s growth but also severely impairs the ability for children to learn.

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Ways to help world leaders know malnutrition is important to us and support the work of Save the Children:

  • Do you tweet? Here’s a sample:  @whitehouse let’s make sure all kids get healthy food in their #next1000days so they can reach their full potential. #Nutrition4Growth
  • Follow Save the Children on Facebook.
  • Follow Save the Children on Pinterest.
  • Make healthy nutrition a priority in your family and schools!

 

How is About Proximity earning our super power cape? A Gr8 Recipe!

This is a simple, healthy, inexpensive recipe we have used in our family since Kris and I were married. (I’m sharing a recipe… for those of you who witness my cooking skills this is a little humorous.) Our kids like this recipe because they get to choose their own toppings.

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For a special addition I would love to give this book away! Simple Strategies for Hiding Healthy Food in Kids’ Favorite Meals.

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Leave a comment to win! 

What’s your favorite healthy recipe? 

Posted in Serve | Tagged , , , , , , | 6 Comments »

A Dream So Big

June 5, 2013 by aboutproximity

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A Dream So Big: Our Unlikely Journey to End the Tears of Hunger

This is the story of the Peifer Family.

Steve Peifer was a manager of a corporate giant. He and his wife Nancy had two sons and lived in Dallas, Texas.

In 1997, their unborn son was said to have trisomy 13 and his condition to be “incompatible with life.” They were advised to abort the baby. They did not listen to that advice and loved their son for the eight days they were given with him.

The loss was deep and their family left for a 12-month assignment as dorm parents in a Kenyan boarding school. 12 months turned into a lifetime of service. Steve now serves as Director of College Guidance at Rift Valley Academy.

Their family established a rural food program that feeds 20,000 school children lunch. They also developed the first solar-powered computer training center in Kenya, and are currently developing more labs for schoolchildren.

 

My dear friend Becky Bing went to high school at Rift Valley Academy. I love her stories of being there and appreciate the loving wisdom she gathered while she lived in Kenya. Reading this book was especially exciting to me to learn more about what she experienced. I loved the book and the remarkable story of the Peifer family.

 

Steve is vulnerable and real in his re-telling of their story. The days were not always easy. You will fall in love with the resilient people of Africa and the Peifer’s who refused to give up.

Humor and tears coexist. The perilous driving conditions, baboons in the schoolyard, funny third-culture adolescent boys reside alongside the faces of starving children, magnadoodles delivered to orphanages and the hope computers bring.

Many Kenyan children only eat one meal a day. The Peifer’s do not look away from the suffering they witness and they summon us to have the strength to do the same.

 

The Peifer family also adopted twins, Katie and Ben while in Kenya. Their court appointed date to finalize the adoptions was on May 4, the exact date their son Stephan had passed away. I love how God can redeem the unredeemable. 

He also writes, Stephan was born six years ago today. March 4 used to be such a hard day. But I look at the twins, at the more than eight thousand schoolkids we feed every day, at the amazing life we live now because of his life, and I can see him in almost everything I do, everything I am. 

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Leave a comment to win a hard-cover copy of the book!

What is your dream so big? 

You can learn more about how to support the program Kenyan Kids Can here.

Posted in Book Review | Tagged , , , , , , , | 8 Comments »

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