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Genuine Experience

How many of you have watched a football game on TV?  Isn't it awesome how when it's a competitive game we get all into it and start rooting for our favorite team, or for the underdog.  And then there's a bad play or blown call and we start screaming at the TV and maybe even throwing a remote control or whatever else is closest to us.  We get so excited when our team wins that we may even jump and down in the living room.  But how much more exciting when we are able to attend the game?  To be inside the stadium, to see the players, to hear the band and the roar of the crowd when a big play happens?  It's so much better to be there isn't it!

That's the experience that we miss out on sometimes when we see a need and feel a call of God to help with something but we simply donate a few dollars instead of actually getting involved.  Now don't get me wrong, giving is good, and needed.  But just like watching the game on TV, being there and seeing the action play out live is much more rewarding.  So the next opportunity you see to give back, ask God if He wants you to do more than give monetarily, he may want your time or abilities to help truly experience Him.

This was made real for me a couple months ago after all the flooding in SC.  The Union County Baptist Association (UCBA) was gathering flood buckets of necessary cleanup items to send to those in need.  Usually when I hear about a tragedy I feel sympathy when I hear about it but honestly that tends to go away when I get home from church or switch the channel and get busy with something else in life.  But for some reason this kept staying on my mind.  Britt and I planned to either donate some money or buy a bucket for around $70, not a small amount of money but not enough to break us either, and felt like we were doing good.  Things ended up working out to where our church raised enough money to purchase items for 10 buckets!  The lady at Home Depot was absolutely shocked when I called her on the phone to ask if they had all of the items in stock for the buckets but it gave me a chance to tell her our church had raised it and not me individually allowing her to see the compassion of Christians at work.  I was blessed up enough to be able to actually go there and help pack the buckets then deliver them to the UCBA once we had everything gathered and collected at the church.  There ended up being a total of 18 buckets donated from Tabernacle which was totally amazing.  But the point I'm trying to make is that I never would have realized how awesome it is to actually be hands on if we had simply made a small donation. 

As the Lottie Moon season for foreign missions giving is coming up please consider helping fund those who are willing to travel around the globe to spread the Word of Christ.  But don't miss out on opportunities in your daily life at home, at work, the gym, or even the grocery store to join God in His work.  There is no substitute for the genuine experience of working with God.

#GiveGodGlory #LottieMoon #Missions #SCFlood

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