When the thumb misses the mouth

The other day I was visiting with a young mother and her little girl. 7 month old Juli was playing and laughing and, as usual, charming the socks off me. We were just chatting away, and then I noticed little Juli trying to get her thumb into her mouth. It was so cute, as this little munchkin repeatedly shoved her thumb to her face - it didn't hurt or anything - she would take it back, as if gauging the distance and then she would shove into her cheek, then into the other cheek and this happened 4 or 5 times in a row. It was so funny, her mom and I just laughed and laughed as her momma finally guided the poor misfiring thumb into her sweet little mouth.

So, here's the point. There are so many times in life I am going along thinking that I have figured out what will make me happy, content and satisfied - I pull back my thumb and jab it toward my mouth, sure that this time it will be the right fit and I will be happy. Then, to my frustration I find that I am not happy and satisfied after all - the pushing for money did not do it and the pushing for more hobbies did not do it and the drive for success and achievement, that didn't do it either and neither did escaping into the sports or the tv or the making everybosy happy around me - each time the thumb seems to have missed my mouth - when all the while, my mouth was right there, waiting for me to hit the mark and find some more peace and satisfaction than I ever had before.

Life in America, it seems, is mostly a pursuit of more - trying to find the right "more" thumb hole to make us finally content - when many times it is actually that we are looking in wrong place for our thumb. At More than more, we are all about helping people begin to look past the "business as usual" American lifestyle to finding something "More" out of life. We can't make you content, but, like Juli's mom, we would like to show you where you may be able to find more peace and more joy and more wonder in life - we'd like to point your thumb toward the mouth it has been searching for - we certainly are finding that the "More" we are finding is more fulfilling, more wonderful, more amazing, more fun than we ever dreamed...

If you are spending your life going after things that just seem like they are not nearly as wonderful as you thought they'd be, if you seem to run after things in life, only to find them not as satisfying as you expected, if your life has an emptyness to it that you just can't seem to fill or shake off, or if you are just curious, we would love to have you join us next Thursday, 4/1/10 at McAllister Recreation Center - just off 20th and Schuyler Ave, Lafayette, 6:45-8:00PM.

I laughed til I nearly fell off my chair

This last Thursday, we had a fabulous time. It was not exactly "usual" even for us, but it was a blast. We laughed over the craziest and sillest things, but mostly we enjoyed being with a group of people who actually care about us with no agenda and enjoyed the peace and comfort of that kind of atmosphere.

We spent time noticing how things have been going in our preparations for Community Outreach 2010, which will be 4/2 at Howarth Center - 18th and Union St's Lafayette. Of special interest this time was how Melissa, who almost never goes to Kmart, stopped in for a quick peak at their shoes and found that they had marked down hundreds of fabulous shoes at 1/2 of the usual clearance price - she got hundreds of shoes to put on the feet of people in our town that don't have good new shoes to wear! Plus, the sales people everywhere we go are falling over themselves to help us even if all they can do is ring the shoes up (and no they are not on comission) so that they can be a part of something so cool! One of them even wants to start coming and being a part of a group of people that can love people like that! What's amazing is that all those shoes at Kmart were just marked to that low price that morning - they would have never lasted through the weekend and Melissa & Heather and Jordan just happened to stop in at that time - just when the time was perfect - truth is God works things out just the right way!

We spent so much time celebrating and laughing and enjoying noticing how God is working everything out that we didn't have much time to do anything else - but we didn't really miss it!

Hope to see you coming up soon at our Shoe Organization Party at Howarth Center garages, 6PM next Wed, or at More than more, 6:45-8:00PM, next Thursday, 4/1 at McAllister Recreation Center - 20th and Schuyler Ave, Lafayette!

Last time & next time

Hey all! We had a fabulous time last Thursday night, the 4th, at McAllister Center. We spent our time talking about sacrifice. Beginning with noticing how humans naturally are made to sacrifice for others that they love, we noticed that we are amazingly well made and actually made to be caring about other people - even though sometimes we don't do this as well as we'd like to. It is an amzing thing to consider that all except the most evil people in the world sacrifice something naturally for other people sometimes.

We then spent some time noticing each other and the amazing people that are More than more, but also the pain in our lives and the hurts we carry and we talked to God about those things - it is amazing to see the pure acceptance that happens in this group, every other Thursday night, month after month, no matter who walks into the group - they care about them, without agenda!

Then we considered the amazing life of searching for More in God and how sometimes it is hard and even painful to give up of yourself for the love of people and to do the best things with your life, but it is so much better than living in selfishness and the lameness of the usual, get more, achieve more, attain more, buy more of American society.

It was a good time to hang out and enjoy each other and the chance we have to make a difference in the world - we will be extending this to our community on 4/2 at Howarth Center, 18 th and Union St's in Lafayette, when we give out shoes and medical care to those in our community who need them! We would love to have you join us in the group - we will be hanging out again next Thursday, the 18th, 6:45-8:00PM at 20th and Schuyler Ave, Lafayette, McAllister Center - hope to see you there!