Advertising and Marketing industries are geared towards one thing: creating discontent.  Their purpose is to make you unhappy with what you have.

I heard an interesting biology lesson once:

Cells are the building blocks of every living thing and each cell functions for the good of the whole being.  We call these healthy cells – they are doing what they were made to do.  But, when an individual cell begins to function only for its own good and ignores its role to support the whole organism, we call this cell CANCER.

It occurred to me during this season of Thanksgiving, that discontent acts as a cancer for us.  We begin to turn inward, thinking of ourselves and what we need to make us happy.  Discontent preoccupies our minds and distracts us with worry and resentment.  It keeps us on edge and feeling as though we are always missing something.

And in the process, we forget that we are created to love – love God and love people.

Giving thanks matters because it is the secret to finding what marketers and advertisers dread – contentment.  And when we are content, we are free to love.

Holy moments often sneak up on us.

On Friday as we drove from Coan Middle School (having set out a welcome back breakfast for the teachers) to Whitefoord Elementary in order to set up a similar breakfast as well as a school supplies store and lead a volunteer group to help the teachers prepare their classrooms, I was not contemplating where God might be at work that day.  Instead, I was busy running through my mental checklist of what needed to be done in the next few hours.  Thanks to generous donations, we were able to set up a school supplies store during Whitefoord Elementary’s open house.  Parents were able to purchase school supplies at 5 items for $1 and there was a great deal of work to be done.

But in the background of this busy day, God was knitting together opportunities for each of us to catch a glimpse of God’s presence in our midst.  As parents began to pour into our makeshift school supplies store, there were a variety of responses.  Some parents eagerly gathered more than enough school supplies for their household, happily paid with a $20, received $15 in change and left feeling pleased to have found such a good deal.  Other parents considered each item more carefully before proudly paying for their child’s supplies.

There were two particular moments that caught my attention.  There was a grandmother who had taken quite a while to select the school supplies on her granddaughter’s list.  When she finally came up to pay, I told her that her total was $3.  She slowly opened a small change purse and searched for the bills to make her purchase.  From behind her, a father, who sat waiting for his wife and son to finish their shopping, handed her $3 with just a nod and sat back down to wait.  Her face broke into a smile as she paid for her daughter’s school supplies.

Later, a custodian who worked at the school came by.  He was disappointed that he couldn’t get his paycheck cashed because he needed to buy school supplies for his 3 children.  I told him to get whatever he needed and we would make it work.  Upon further encouragement, he finally walked around the room and gathered the supplies his children would need.  When we sent him home with school supplies and 3 new book bags, he was grinning from ear to ear.

Moments when we catch a glimpse of the depth of the human heart, and we experience God’s overwhelming, extravagant love for our fragile humanity – these are holy moments indeed.

I think God loves to show us glimpses of a reality that is far deeper and richer than what we experience in our everyday busyness.  These glimpses remind us that God’s presence is not a stagnant reality, but a dynamic movement in the world.

Are you watching for God?

A few years ago I read a book (Not for Sale: The Return of the Global Slave Trade–and How We Can Fight It by David Batstone) that opened my eyes to a heartbreaking reality.  I was appalled to learn that the sale of human beings continues to this day – something our society so easily recognizes as an abhorrent part of our history, and yet, it is still allowed to continue!

Modern day slavery in Georgia is happening now. Most alarming is the rate of commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC) – approximately 400-500 girls are trafficked EACH MONTHin Georgia.  90% of these girls are African American and the age of first incidence is getting younger – some as young as 10 or 11 years old.  Isolation, manipulation, physical and verbal abuse are all used to coerce these girls into believing they have no alternative and no safe place to go.

One of my greatest frustrations with this particular brand of cruelty is that I feel helpless to protect these girls.  But there are ways to help.  Recently, we have come into contact with several organizations that are working to fight CSEC in Georgia.  This month Edgewood Church will be helping to support the work of these organizations in two ways: promoting awareness of the commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC) that goes on in Atlanta and collecting needed items for women and girls in recovery housing.

We need your help! On July 17^th we will be canvassing the Edgewood neighborhood to leave doorknockers inviting our neighbors to learn more about CSEC and to help us collect items for shelters.  Then during the week of July 19^th – 24^th, we will be collecting these items at the Whitefoord Community Program in Edgewood.  Come out and help on July 17^th – and bring a friend!

Click here for more details.

Other ways you can help:

• Become informed.  Start here: Street Grace, Juvenille Justice Fund, A Future Not a Past.
• Commit to mentor at-risk teens.
• Pray for: the breakdown of the systematic exploitation of children, the rescue and restoration of victims, the protection of potential victims, the redemption of pimps, traffickers and customers, and our policy makers to pass effective legislation to ultimately eradicate child sex trafficking.. (Prayer from Street Grace)

Statistical information gathered from Street Grace and Hidden in Plain View: 2005 Mayor’s Report.