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November 27, 2005
Glaucia's back!
Sorry world for not posting in over a month! My wonderful and beautiful wife is back in town (her blog). She went to Indonesia for two weeks on a mission trip, while I stayed home in New York with the boys. I had a lot of help from my in-laws (sister-in-law Raquel's blog). I learned much about God's mercy and patience with all the time I spent with my sons. I got to spend Thanksgiving with Glaucia, Willik, and Phoenix, along with plenty members of the Brazilian church that my father-in-law, Paulo, pastors. I think before this year, I had to go to work for three Thanksgivings in a row. It was good to not have to work this time around.
It's been good to have Glaucia back this whole week. Glaucia's still recovering from the 12-hour time zone adjustment, so she's been sleepy during times that we normally would get to talk. I haven't heard many of the stories yet from her trip, because she's just been too tired to stay awake when the kids are asleep. One thing I'm very excited about is one of the first things she said on the day she got back. She said we should start planning a mission trip to China and saving up for it. Awesome! I'm very excited about the new fire that's been kindled in her heart. I love the thought of our family being a missionary family.
I've been praying fervently every day about what my family's purpose is. I like the idea that we are a team with passions designed by God. I've been trying to make the focus of our household centered around God and on what He's created us to be. He created an artist in Glaucia. Since she's been a mother, she's sacrificed almost every moment of the past 4 years to not pursuing art as her daily life. While she's been gone, and when the kids have been sleeping, I've been trying to organize our apartment to give Glaucia some art space. I've been clearing out closets, drawers, and bins of clothes and stuff that I don't need. My apartment is still cluttered with too much stuff, but I've felt great having a focus on making art space for Glaucia. I began resurrecting art supplies that have been buried deep in our clutter and placing them into an accessible set of drawers. There is plenty to do, but I'm getting very close to having enough floor space to set up her drawing table. This is a piece of furniture she's had since her college days at F.I.T. and hasn't been alive for at least 8 years!
Making writing space for myself isn't as important to me, since I don't need much but a pen and paper (It just feels more natural than typing on a laptop). But I would like to create some space for delving into the geeky world of robotics. Not much experience in that area, just some supplies and a big fascination with programming machines.
Willik and Phoenix have most of the space dedicated to them. They've got almost our entire living room with toys they love to scatter everywhere. I've been attempting to spend more time in their world as opposed to giving them a little world to play in while I manage my own. I've noticed that they could be begging to play with the computer or PlayStation 2, but I could start building with Legos and they would join me and forget about all their demands for computer games. I need to remember that more often.
Today at Graffiti we had a guest speaker share about the parable of the master giving money to his three servants(found in Matthew 25:14-30). I like this parable. We often interpret this to mean that if you don't use your talents for God's glory, you will lose out on your reward in Heaven. I've been looking at this in a slightly different way. The "money" the master has given us is our moments in time that God has shown us what to do or say. Only you would know what those moments are. I know many moments in my life where I wasn't doing something bad, but I was ignoring a need that I saw in a person. It's easy to ignore a need in someone if they've never expressed that need by speaking up. People speak much louder than their words. I feel I've seen needs in people that I've ignored, because nobody is expecting me to respond. In that sense, I am as guilty as the servant who buried his money and didn't risk the investment of love and compassion in the tiniest, most unnoticed moments in my life. Here's an example that sounds VERY insignificant:
Last week, I saw a family parking in a spot in midtown. They all got out of the car. They looked like they were trying to figure out if they need to pay for the parking meter. This was Thanksgiving day. In New York City, nobody needs to pay parking meters on Federal holidays. I felt I could make their lives easier by just telling them that they don't need to pay the meter. I never told them. I think they figured it out for themselves. It was just the tiniest, unnoticed moment in anybody's life. But I strongly feel that those are the moments that we will be held accountable for. I can picture Jesus asking me what I was avoiding in that moment. I was just being a New Yorker. And that's my problem. I've been conformed to the mindset of my society and not to the mindset of the Spirit.
Right now, my moments to focus on are with my wife and children. I would love to change the world by empowering the common man with knowledge. I would love to organize the owners of little mom and pop stores to come together and create a system where they are not eaten alive by Big Box Mart. I would like to spread internet access to starving villages in remote parts of the world. But those are the big noticeable things that might get my name recognized by books and what not. The little moments that God has given me are the ones with my wife and kids. That's where I'll be held accountable on the day I'm introduced to eternity.
Posted by fabijo at 10:15 PM | Comments (3)