Starfish

One day an old man was walking along the beach, when he noticed a young boy hurriedly picking things up and throwing them back in the water.  "Young man, what are you doing?" he asked. "Throwing starfish back in the ocean.  The tide is going out.  If I don't throw them back, they'll die," the boy replied. The old man laughed to himself and said, "Don't you realize that there are miles of beach and hundreds of starfish?  What you're doing won't make any difference." The boy bent down, picked up another starfish, and threw it back into the sea.
  "It made a difference to that one."  

--Loren Eisley

One of the things that discourages and overwhelms me the most working in this country is the sheer volume of the need. It never ends no matter what you do. It's exhausting if you focus on it for too long, and frankly it's hard to not focus on it when it's in your face every day. When I start feeling overwhelmed, I usually do two things: remind myself that even Jesus didn't fix everything when He was here on earth; He did only what his Father told him to do. And I focus on a single starfish. Tonight, that starfish is Marta.

If this was your kitchen,would you have a smile on your face?  I'm not sure I would.  I got frustrated by the constant mold in mine, and I have a whole room for a kitchen. I have dishes, cabinets, countertops, and a stove. I even have a faucet in there, and water usually comes out of it! I'm rich by comparison. What you see in that picture is 1/4 of Marta's whole house.  She lives there with 5 of her children. To say that it's sad is a major understatement.  And it isn't something we can fix overnight. But because of the combined efforts of Loving InDeed, Finding Freedom Through Friendship, and sweet people like Joel and Rachel Chance, this little corner of Marta's world now looks like this:

Marta got a decent new stove!  She no longer has to cook right in the dirt.  And this new one is vented outside--no more breathing in that awful wood smoke! Not only that, but Joel gave up his Saturday to weatherproof the house by nailing up boards on the outside to cover the giant gaps that were letting in the wind and rain. In the first picture, he was only half done--the wall behind Marta's head. But you can see how bad it was before by looking at the wall on the right.  Now look at those same walls in this picture--no more gaps! (We did run out of wood on the bottom, but I'll fix that later.)

While the improvements in Marta's home have truly made a great difference in their quality of life, I don't think that's the most important thing that we did for her.  I think that just caring about her for a day was more important-- teaching her kids how to pound in a nail, playing with her puppies, relaxing with ice creams together, sweating and getting filthy together, helping to share her burden for a day--those are the things that matter the most. I cannot possibly understand everything Marta goes through in a day, but I do know some of what it's like to not have a man around to help take care of things.  Can I take care of myself?  Of course I can. I've been doing it for a long time. But that doesn't mean I necessarily like it or that it's easy.  And I have all of you! I have a family who would do anything for me. I have friends who would go to great lengths to help me if something was wrong. I have a safety net, so to speak, even if it isn't a husband. I know I always have the Lord, but I'm trying not to hyper-spiritualize it. Sometimes you need someone with skin on, and I think that part of God's provision comes in the form of friends and family.  Marta does not have a great support system. So for a day, we--Joel, Rachel, Jody, Kathy, Gerry, Betsy, Paula, Jen, Kristin, Paul, Eileen, Carol, John, Stephanie, Bob, Peggy, Isha, Sue, Kevin, Cheryl, Kailah, Adam, Betty, Willa...and every other person who has ever supported FFF or LI--got to be that for her.  We got to carry her load, even if for just a little while.  So just for tonight, I'm trying to get my focus off the other 20 widows with their equally pressing needs (and the thousands of others who aren't in the program) and just be happy for this one little starfish that made it back to the sea. There will be time for other starfish tomorrow.

For more information on Finding Freedom Through Friendship, you can check out Jody's blog at: http://www.finding-freedom-through-friendship.org/