"It's a Sad Day When You Can Slip on Your Sons Shoes!"

I stepped outside and slipped on my eldests shoes. They almost fit. A guy is here making a path of sidewalks in front of our house. I said, "It's a sad day when you can slip on your sons shoes".


"Yeah, I guess so."

"Oh, you don't have children?" (what is the polite way to ask that question?)

"Well..my wife and I have been trying for 3 years. She is now 14 weeks from giving birth to our baby boy." Wow, I said, congratulations.

You see they had been trying and could never figure out why they hadn't gotten pregnant yet. But God's timing is so impeccable. And looking at it in hindsight it is always more beautiful as opposed to being in it and being frustrated.

Last year they went to Kenya(if she were pregnant then she would not have been able to go) to help at an orphanage that a lady 15 miles from our house started. I have never heard of it until today - God's timing. Jump for Joel is the name of the organization. Four years ago this lady who is around my age, needed 2,000 dollars to go to Kenya on a missions trip. She didn't have the money so she prayed. Lo and behold, her college, the U of I, sent her a 2,000 dollar check stating that she had over payed that year on her tuition - God's timing.

From that she has started an orphanage in Kenya that has over 90 children. I know what your thinking if you're mind is like mine, let's go adopt them. But did you know that Kenya has strict laws stating that you have to live in Kenya for 2 years before you can adopt and the children have to have proper paperwork to be adopted. Many of them don't have any parents let alone proper paperwork. Joel and his sister Faith are two children that are HIV+ and the founder fell in love with them thus the name Jump for Joel...and as I'm typing I just now get the play on words about Jump for Joy..OK, anyway :)

This man cutting a path in my front yard has taken me down a path today..and you as well..God's timing. While him and his wife went on this trip they got to see a VBS of sorts that is organized in Kenya on Saturdays. 120 children gather there to get to have poridge for lunch, play games, hear the Bible and have beans and rice for supper. Two meals like that is a feast to them. Many children eat every other day. Once they got back from the trip, this wife(I don't know her name) of the man working in our yard decided to organize a marathon to raise money for the food for these VBS's. That money was purely donation and they didn't know where the rest was going to come from. She was going to run 26.2?miles and raise money. 63 people came to run and raises $6,363.00. Enough for the rest of this year!! See how awesome our God is!

check out their site: http://www.jumpforjoel.org/

This year is the first year they have young people old enough to go to college and that can happen with us and our donation - God's Timing.

If God had never used my mouth to say "It's a sad day when.." this conversation may have never happened. I may have never heard this man say, "while we were in Kenya we walked the streets at 4 am to see little potato sacks moving and kids crawling out, cold and covered with urine, sniffing glue and drinking alcohol to make it another day." All because of God's timing has Jump for Joel came to be. And all because of God's timing will WE be able to play a part in giving someone else a chance to walk in someone else's shoes. To go down another path.