od morning and happy Saturday. I am off to a good start this morning since my laptop computer refuses to wake up. Maybe it needs some coffee too. Oh well, at least I have the very small screen of my phone to type on. It is a good reminder that everything doesn’t always go as planned 🙂
Speaking of that, as you may have heard, the country of Haiti is still in turmoil after the assassination of their president. Gang violence, kidnappings, fuel and food scarcity continue to be a problem. Prices for goods have increased dramatically. Praise God that Jacques and the kids in the orphanage have remained safe. Please continue to pray for them. Also, school is scheduled to start soon. The kids will be needing uniforms, shoes, books, supplies and fees. Therefore, I want to try to raise $ 5000 to pay for these things. If anyone is interested in helping me in this effort let me know. Or, if you want, you can give on line or drop a check in the offering. Anything you can do will be appreciated.
In light of that, we transition to something that illustrates our first world problems. Recently at the church our toilet paper supply was running low. Someone went to the local Stuff-Mart and bought a large multi-pack with the TP they were promoting. Admittedly, it was a thing of beauty. These were no ordinary rolls of toilet paper. These were not the industrial grade single ply low grit sand paper that we used to buy. No, these were more like travel pillows. They were the new jumbo rolls of ultra soft yet durable paper. One had to closely examine them to determine if it really was paper or rolls of Egyptian cotton. With a great sense of pride, we refilled our paper dispensers at the church knowing that we had found the answer to church growth. People from miles around would now want to come to our church to experience the luxurious comforts of our restroom stalls. As we refilled our TP we noticed the new rolls fit a bit snugly in the dispensers since they were mega rolls but we were so excited we didn’t give it a second thought. It was only later that we would discover the tragedy of the situation. It has been said that most plans fail in the execution stage. Well, this was no exception. In actual field trials by unsuspecting users, the paper simply would not come out of the dispensers in the time of greatest needs. In fact, you couldn’t even get a full square in some cases. Instead, you could only tear bits and pieces off of the paper trying desperately to get it to come out. In one stall I discovered a bunch of tiny pieces left behind. Likely the results of some poor soul desperately seeking enough paper to complete the task at hand. If that was you, please accept our apologies. Once we realized the magnitude of the crisis we had created, we removed the luxurious jumbo rolls and replaced them with something that actually works in our dispensers. It is sad to think that you could be there in your time of need with 3 jumbo rolls of the fluffiest paper known to mankind right there behind the smoky plastic dispenser and yet they could not be used. Perhaps we needed a sign that said, “In case of emergency break the glass.” Anyway, this is an example that too much of a good thing can be bad. Similar to kids that eat too much candy on Halloween. Maybe at some point, we need to stop the endless pursuit of more and more, bigger and better, more luxurious, and be content for once.
We are told that if we have food and clothing with that be content. I think we can add basic toilet paper to the list.
Have a good Saturday. Hope to see you tomorrow as Pastor Fitsum concluded his series. Next week, I kick off our new series in the book of Joshua.
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