The Gristle

I had to spell check that word to make sure it was right. But I came up with a different meaning than what I had intended. Unfortunately this isn't going to be a hugely spiritually significant post on a life lesson learned. It's 130 in the morning and I leave in about 5 hours for South Africa so thoughts and ideas are slightly scattered. I kind of just finished packing...

Usually before I travel I cut my hair pretty short, so right now the gristle refers to the feeling of the short freshly cut hair, maybe it should be the bristle... Perhaps due to lack of adequate sleep my mind has settled on a word that shouldn't be used.

Being in Southern Africa always hits you with so many emotions. The helplessness, the overwhelming feeling of inadequacy, the anger and frustration at how so many children's innocence is stolen. It's hard to describe driving through places where you know the children's life expectancy is only about 30 years. It's frustrating trying to answer secondary student's questions about HIV/ AIDS. A disease that is honestly and literally going to cause some of their countries to be extinct if behavior doesn't change.

And somehow I'm supposed to prepare 14 young people to be ready to face these situations for the next three months.

In Africa AIDS is destroying the nations, in America materialism is corrupting our thinking and our priorities.

The gristle is that it's so easy for us to not even take five minutes to pray for God's Justice and His hand to rescue those in need.

I'm going to post this now, and someday soon I'll probably go back and read it and edit it... trying to make sense of what I was thinking... or not thinking... the gristle.

Thanks for reading