Soups On.

 

There are so many things that you guys are all doing for us while we are gone. The system of running our lives back home is in your hands and we are so thankful that each of you are playing the parts you are to keep things going. If that is our ministries, cars, our bills, our home, you guys have stepped up to help us and we can�t say thank you enough.  More than anything at home you can do for us though, we thank you for the way that you have allowed our children the privilege of the blanket of prayer that you lay over them and us through the day. In their short lives I am daily more astounded at what I am learning that these children have been through and how they are still the people they are today. Grace� oh grace.

 

They are sub-society here. We were told that one of the guys who helps to get apartments is not thrilled at all that he is finding them for people who are adopting. He doesn�t like to rent with people who have children in the first place but �orphans� oh no. They are scum. There is not a place for them in this society except the bottom of the pile. That is it for all of us isn�t it? In the spiritual realm are we not really bottom dwellers because of our sinful nature? Only by grace are we invited, adopted, to be a part of His family. Only through this invitation to family are we taught what it is to love, and serve, and serve in love. Only through adoption are we legally His and therefore are we due the full rights and privileges of that position in His family.  Only through Christ is that legal sin debt paid and the transaction completed because of His sacrifice on our behalf. His blood cancels our sin through the grace of God�s forgiveness. 

 

Watching Chris Underwood eat at Fridays when we first got here was precious. He was eating food he could not have provided for himself, it was a feast, and it was the richest of fair for him. We are invited to get full at His table. We are invited to slurp up His word with the delight of a child relishing in the taste of fettuccini and our favorite drink that doesn�t run dry.  Something more than the mush of what the world has fed us for so long. It is more than all we could afford for ourselves but the Ultimate Parent is picking up the tab so get what you want out of this delightful invitation to supper.

 

I hope that as you go through the day you will choose to make a space and pull yourself up to His table. Smell all the good things cooking in His word. As you would in your own family�s kitchen allow yourself to be served up the goodness there in. As you munch on what He teaches you call someone else and tell them about the flavor you have encountered. Pass along a recipe He shares with you. You never know what someone else is in need of and what you have just been served might just be the nourishment someone else hasn�t thought to try. Maybe it is one of their favorite dishes but they don�t know how to make it and the Holy Spirit has given you the main ingredient and they just need that special spice right now to help them to get the mixture down right for their own lives.

 

When we were in college, Kyle Matthews and his lovely wife Susan, led worship for us. They are in Tennessee last we heard. They are running a mission camp there I think. We ran into them one day at a Chick-Fil-A, where else but the Christian Chicken right? Anyway, Kyle used to sing this song, �Welcome to the Best Stuff in the World Today Caf�.� It is one of the songs that when we first heard it helped to shape an image for us of service and a sense of balance in the Christian life of who we are to one another. All of us are customers and all of us are servants. Like when Calyn Reber or likewise Valerie Hall got in the game at the respective Waffle Houses because the staff was so busy and needed a hand. Who does such a thing? Servant hearted people who are looking for a practical way to show the love of Christ to someone in a way that I KNOW had to have made a lasting impression!

 

I gather a goodly sum of you who are choosing to follow the shenanigans (or �Shenackagans� if you are Sarah Jo Bone) of the Smith family are a part of God�s family already. If you find yourself curious over His family, this concept of Christ, why do these people seem to refer back to God so much, or any number or combination of these questions you are someone we would love to serve. We would love to share with you, as much as we can in our limited knowledge of our Unlimited God, answers He has given to us. Will you walk through our �cyber caf�� and sit at the table? Will you ask us what is on the menu today and allow us to give you the King�s choicest portions? We are here not only to expand our family through adoption, but because of His grace and love to us His family as well. Introduce yourself, we will do our best to reply if not now for sure when we arrive home. There is always room at the table for another brother and sister. We welcome you to the family and hope you will decide to stay with us a while, or forever which ever comes first.

 

Waiting for you at the table�

 

Jenn for the Smiths