In May 2008, my husband returned from Malawi, Africa with this picture of a precious little boy holding two "balls" - made of plastic bags and string. My husband said the back of his shirt was completely missing. His shirt was only being held together by the collar.A few months later, my daugther tries out for a travel softball team and she makes it. The team asks us to raise $1000 for her, so that she can have two uniforms - with her name and number on the hat, batting bag and shirt.
A few weeks later, Stella Kaisyre had dinner with us. She lives in Malawi, and she is supported by my church to attend to the many needs of the people there. She had hosted my husband and the team while he was there.
During our conversation, I was just chatting about my daugther making a travel team and that we had to raise money for her. Stella says, "How much money?" I could hardly speak. I wanted to crawl under the couch or throw up. "A thousand dollars", I said.
A week or two later, it was my nine year old son's football "homecoming" weekend. He wore a clean, crisp navy and gold uniform with this name on the back of his shirt. The parents brought paint to paint the cars, team tatoos for our faces, matching scarves for each mom, cow bells painted with the team logo and then we decorated a rented trailer with streamers and ballons. And of course, we already have photo buttons to wear too. The football team gets to ride in the trailer for about 5 minutes and then we tore off the streamers and ballons. The trailer had to be returned. And then we went to a large football feast party afterwards.
I just felt sick. Look at all we have. Look at the waste. Look at how over the top it is. The little boy with plastic bag balls continues to flash in my mind.
OK, my family is over blessed. I have to do something. A friend of mine says, "Blessed to Be a Blessing." I emailed Stella and told her that I would like to buy soccer balls for the kids of Malawi. Could she buy them there? Would it be helpful or would it just be more than she wanted to add to her plate?
She responded by telling me of a upcoming youth camp in November. Two kids would be chosen from 100 churches. They would love to have t-shirts, bibles and balls for each child that attends. The balls would be used by the youth clubs to prepare for the annual " Msungamoyo Trophy ", sponsored by World Relief Malawi. "It means Preserve Life."
I got to work. With one phone call, I was able to get 50 free soccer balls donated by "the soccer family" of Chicago and money was given to cover the cost of 50 netballs ordered from India. With more emails and phone calls, t-shirts were donated at cost and the money for the bibles was donated. Wow! I couldn't have planned this on my own. It has to be God moving.
A week or so later, I was showing the picture of the African boy above to a friend and as I stared at it, the face of the little boy (on the right) popped into my head. This is the little boy that I played with every day after school on the farm that I grew up on. His name is Pookie, and he was my best friend. We played Dodge ball everyday, and we danced liked crazy too!
Then I realized that God's story (the upper story - meeting the needs of kids in Africa) and my story as a child had just collided.
God can use all of our story for kingdom purposes.
Here is a picture taken in November 2008 of the kids in Chitipa with their new soccer balls! God is good. He wants us to have the thrill of doing his work of bringing heaven to earth.