How Could I Forget YOU?

I know that everyone has had the experience of either being left behind or forgotten on a trip by a parent, teacher or church leader. What’s horrible is when you are the leader and you accidently forget someone. I can’t believe last night after our late night walk with our dogs that we were in the process of fixing a gourmet meal and discovered that one of our little dogs was missing. I go into the panic mode and look in the back yard and then upstairs. Sometimes our little dogs get their feelings hurt and go up into our bedroom and hide under our spacious king size bed. Finally I go to the front door and open it to see little Carly who had been left outside. I was so angry with my Anne, and myself, how could we have done that? I can’t fathom what went through our little Carly’s mind.

It is too easy to not look around and see the kids, teens or adults who have been forgotten or left out of life and go on with whatever you are doing. I spent a good portion of my Tuesday morning talking with people that could easily be forgotten or left behind. We did some community surveys at the DES Office in my neighborhood to be intentional about connecting with neighbors that are struggling in life circumstances. It is too easy to be busy, even with doing good things and miss out on doing great things that ultimately will make a difference in my life and those around me.

I have a good friend who has been a mentor on my journey with doing neighborhood or community work who talks about the other Phoenix and the fact that too often society and the church ignores those who are considered as the leftovers or forgotten in life. I spend a good portion of my day loving on youth that could easily be viewed as not worth the effort to help. It is too easy to only spend time with those who are like me and fit into my world. Yet, what I’m learning is that even my little dog, Carly, deserves to be treated better than being left outside our front door. Yes, neither Anne nor I intentionally left our little pouch outside, yet, it would have been so easy to have eaten a great meal and forgotten our little friend.

My passion is to help those around me open their eyes up to see the people next to them, who have been left behind by society, church or family and see the impact they can have on that person’s life.  It doesn’t take too much brainpower to keep your eyes open to see the world around you. Yes, I can remember the one time when we were at Disneyland and lost our little Heather. We did the usual parent thing and frantically looked around and I ran in all directions only to hear over the loudspeaker system that the parents of Heather Bennett are lost. Please come to the information booth, which was literally in front of us.  I was relieved to have my little girl back!

I went to bed last night with this horrible feeling of trying to understand how my little dog felt when she thought she had been abandoned and locked out of her house. Yet, there are millions everyday who go to bed hungry, without a bed or roof over their heads. What is something that you or I can do today that will make a difference in one of these lives?