The Dangers of Building a Life-Sized Giraffe

My daughter has informed me that our family is weird.  Every teenager thinks their families are strange, so most times her statement holds no validity.  However, as I thought of the things we do in ministry, I realized she may be right.  If you have every been in a ministry position, you may agree with this.  When our church has a VBS, guess who dress as strange characters like the Hulk.  We do!  How about filming a reality show or goofy skit made to look like a Spanish soap opera in public for Christmas.  That's us, too!  This week topped them all. Our church is having a mission's banquet.  Our special guest speaker is a missionary to Africa, so we wanted to make him welcome.  My daughter came home from work to find me building a 3-D life-sized baby giraffe in our living room.  She immediately started taking pictures to show her friends how weird her mother is.  I asked her, "Doesn't everyone build baby giraffes in their living rooms?"  Apparently, they do not.  I had just mentioned how clumsy my oldest son is.  He seems to hurt himself all the time.  I quickly found out from whom he had inherited that particular skill.  As I sat on the floor holding a baby giraffe head, I tried to pull the last of the duct tape off of the roll.  If you have ever used duct tape, and you have if you are from the South, then you know that you need to pull really hard to get that last little bit to come free.  I held the giraffe head with my arm while one hand held the roll, and the other hand pulled the tape.  I pulled hard, but it wouldn't budge.  I pulled harder until, and here it comes, my hand slipped off the tape.  The result was that I punched myself in the face.  I'm thankful my daughter was not in the room to film that moment, or I might have gone viral.  I knew I had bloodied my lip.  Later, my daughter mentioned I still had blood under my lip.  No, I had bruised my face right under my lip.  At least it looked like lipstick.  I then cut my finger with my scissors.  My son ran to get a bandaid and toilet paper as I dripped blood on the floor.  So my giraffe was built on blood, sweat, and tears (from my daughter laughing at me).  I always focus on a Biblical truth from my experiences.  You may ask what is that truth?  When you work on anything, accidents happen, more so if you are my son, my father, or I.  When I prepare to build, I go into the project aware that I may get hurt.  I always get burnt when baking or using a glue gun.  Why do I continue?  Because the result of the project is worth the pain.  When the church works together, accidents happen.  People say and do things that hurt others.  But why do I continue to attend church and work with Christians knowing I may be hurt?  Because when I reach Heaven one day, I will find that the result of my faithfulness will be worth the pain.  That is why I don't quit!

Have a great week high-heeled warriors!

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