Happy 18th Birthday!

This past week flew by just as quickly as the weekend did. I was a very motivated girl at work this week - actually getting up and arriving on time! All the items on my to-do list are marked off and my office is overly organized and clean...just in case little Sam arrives this weekend. I'm sure this only means he won't...

A very important event happened this week - Sieara celebrated her 18th birthday! As I've mentioned before, I initially met Sieara at Camp Hope 2008 when she was 15. Our mentor relationship began later that fall. Since then, Marc and I can certainly say she has become part of our family. Sieara likes to say, as she rolls her eyes, that she always feels adopted when she hangs out with us. I've decided to think of it as a compliment even though I'm sure it's another way for Sieara to remind me that I'm really not cool at all. And, while I know that Sieara has her own family, I am thankful she considers to have an "adopted" family in us. And, my prayer is she sees beyond us and sees that she's a part of God'sadopted family. Anywho, after day 2 day of How to Have a Baby Weekend Crash Course, Marc and I went to pick-up Sieara and her cousin for a birthday dinner celebration. Celebrating Sieara's birthday has become an annual tradition that I probably look forward to as much, if not more, than Sieara. I just LOVE birthdays! And, to make my mom really proud, I came prepared with a birthday box - an essential item of the birthday celebration - that included candles, a birthday hat, a birthday necklace, a camera, Sieara's a gift, and a FAFSA application...you know...the essentials...

We celebrated Sieara's 18th birthday at Buckhead Diner and as usual, Sieara enjoyed every moment of feeling special....as she should. I love watching her in those moments because I see a freedom in her smile, a freedom I know she doesn't experience in her daily life. And, a freedom that we only experience in Christ. Happy 18th Birthday Sieara! Marc, Bailey, Sam and I love you!

Sieara and her cousin Leah
(they are making fun of one of our preggo pics in the bottom picture - hope to share proofs soon!)

Hold Up...

Please excuse this break in the preggo update for an important announcement: Sieara was on HOMECOMING COURT! My sweet mentee, who I have known since she was 15 and who is now about to be 18 (crazyness!) was nominated to be on Homecoming Court at her school. Last week, we went shopping for THE dress that made her feel like royalty while she strutted down the 50-yard line. I'm fairly certain I enjoyed picking out the dress as much as she did. She settled on a strapless dress with a pink and black sequenced-top and pleated skirt. You could tell it was THE dress because when she came out of the dressing room, she was twirling and holding out her skirt just like a princess would...I am blessed that I was able to witness such a sweet moment in her life.

Then we had to pick shoes and our moment was over...because I was reminded that Sieara is a teenage girl. Of course she wanted the shoes with the MOST heel, MOST platform and MOST sequences (aka...stripper shoes). Somehow, they too made her feel like a princess. Every part of my being just thought those shoes were just a little too mature is probably the best way to describe it...but I caved.

Saturday night, Marc and I loaded up to go watch Sieara's homecoming football game...but let's be honest, I think Marc was the only one watching football. FINALLY, it was half time and the moment of truth. There could only be one Homecoming King and Queen.

I'm sad to say that Sieara was not selected as Homecoming Queen...but at that point, it really didn't matter. She had confidently walked out onto the field, smiled and even applauded (with a smile) when they announced the winner. That night was for Sieara. Even though she didn't win, she was willing to take a risk - which I will just tell you, is a big, GI-normus moment in her life. Sieara felt so special and beautiful that night. My hope for her is that she knows, if she doesn't already, that her Heavenly Father thinks she is that special and beautiful every day of her life - Homecoming Queen or not (even though I do have to say Sieara looked MUCH cuter than the winner...just sayin....).

"You are altogether beautiful, my darling, beautiful in every way." - Song of Solomon 4:7

Happy 17th Birthday Sieara!

Today, I celebrated Sieara's 17th birthday. Well, her actual birthday was yesterday but she didn't have school today because it was Election Day, so I picked her and her cousin, Leah, up for an early dinner at a Japanese Hibachi Grill! Yummy (even though it makes my stomach hurt)! I can't believe she is 17 now...it just seems like yesterday that I was the adult counselor in her cabin at Camp Hope. For some reason that year, our cabin seemed to be the trouble cabin...from starting a water fight to the girls getting in trouble for dress code, but it seemed those were the times that Sieara had the most fun. She drove me a little crazy at camp because she had an attitude capable of making a whole room get cold. But after camp, I called her to let her know she wasn't moving up a level at camp because of this. I expected more attitude but instead, she thanked me for helping her with a situation at home. I saw a glimpse of Sieara's vulnerability beneath that tough exterior. For the past 2 years we have hunt out, and I've had the opportunity to watch her open up, even if it was laced with a little attitude. Like the time that she told me that my butt looked big in the pants I was wearing. When I looked at her shocked, she said, "What?! That's a compliment when you tell a black girl that." At least she tells the truth!

I am so thankful that she has shared the past 2 years of her life with me, and I look forward to all that God has in store for her! Happy 17th Birthday Sieara!

Me, Sieara and her cousin Leah

Marc's Recap of Catalyst

I wanted to share a recent paper my sweet hubby wrote for school. Marc never ceases to amaze me how much he can accomplish in a week - working 30+ hours at Chick-fil-A, reading a few books for school and writing papers when he gets home, and any additional projects or chores I ask of him. I am so proud of him, so check out his recap of Catalyst:

I attended Catalyst for the first time last year and was instantly hooked. I came home each night and regurgitated the amazing things I heard to my wife, Cris, and told her that I wanted her to attend with me this year. I work for Chick-fil-A’s corporate office, here in Atlanta, and am lucky that they consider the Catalyst conference an opportunity for training and development and pay for me to attend.

I attended the conference with several things on my mind. I am entering my final year of school, looking toward graduation in June. After working for 2 years as a part-time analyst at Chick-fil-A, I am also looking to move into a full-time position at the beginning of the year. Both school and work fall under my “have-to” commitments. In addition, I am also involved in my church as well as my wife’s work with kidz2leaders, Inc., a non-profit that works with prisoners’ children in the Metro-Atlanta area.

Entering the labs on Wednesday, I chose to attend the sessions that seemed to speak to urban ministry as well as teen ministry, the focus of my efforts with kidz2leaders and my church. I began with Eric Mason as he spoke about incarnational mission, defining it as “understanding and practice of Christian witness that is rooted in and shaped by the life, ministry, suffering, death, and resurrection of Jesus.” He also said, “In order to be a healer, the church needs to know the wounds of the city firsthand.” These comments hit home for me as Cris and I have been recently discussing how to become more involved in the lives of the kids from kidz2leaders. We both knew that the weeklong camp each summer and sporadic events throughout the year were not enough to make a true investment in the kids’ lives.

Every summer at Camp Hope, youth from an Atlanta suburb come from their nice homes and new technology to spend a week with the under-privileged kids from inner-city Atlanta. It becomes easy for me to look at the suburban youth as the perfect examples from Tim Elmore’s Generation iY, completely self absorbed, lacking character, and entitled. But as I consider these negative qualities about the youth, and become hard on them for their lack of investment in the society around them, I realize that I live in their same neighborhoods. I feel convicted that I too go to the communities that the Camp Hope kids live in, often taking them out of their neighborhoods for an event, then returning them back home before I come back to my comfort zone. Though I understand that the kids from Camp Hope have a hard life at home, I do not understand what they face daily because I am not in the middle of their lives daily.

My misunderstanding of their lives and the things that they face bring about additional questions as well. As Eric Mason warned us to “never reduce the Gospel to only a part of the Gospel,” TD Jakes also challenged us to “Go into all the world, not all of our community,” and to leave our “corner” of comfort in order to expand our mindset. He said, “If you only talk to people like yourself, your truth is distorted” and “Until you are willing to be uncomfortable, you will not grow.” These statements all hit home for me. Since camp this summer, Cris and I have been discussing how we could get more involved with the kids in their own neighborhoods, and we both have a desire to spend significant amounts of time with them, not just the extra time that we have after our commitments. We want to be able to spend time with them daily and have a place that they call their own, where we can meet them there, in their community. As Alan and Debra Hirsch discussed, we desire to have a relationship similar to an extended family with these kids. It becomes easy for us to get hung up in our nuclear family, and it becomes especially easy for me to want to protect my family from the “dangers” of a different society. However, I truly believe what TD Jakes said; “No one single people group represents the totality of who God is.” Believing that, I cannot know the fullness of God in my white-suburbia neighborhood and family. I have to go into the communities with these children and I have to be willing to learn, not assuming that I know the best answers. Too often I am tempted to share the things that I know or that I have learned rather than taking the time to learn from those that are not like me.

Naturally, there are many things that Cris and I feel limit us from being able to jump right in to being with these kids. For one, I work 30+ hours a week for Chick-fil-A’s corporate office and spend most of my nights completing my school work. After working part-time for two years, paying my own insurance, and making an hourly salary, I am on the verge of having the opportunity to move into a full-time position that will be salaried and include a nice benefits package. As exciting as it is, and as much as I love working for Chick-fil-A, I can’t help but wonder if this job is my “bowl of stew.” It’s weird to ponder that, as I believe that God works through Chick-fil-A and I have been incredibly blessed by the men that I have been able to work with the past two years. However, I know that my appetite desires a larger salary, which will allow me to better support my family as well as make some required improvements on my house, as well as receive benefits, including maternity insurance so that Cris and I can start a family. Though I can argue all day that my desires for both of those are biblical, I can’t help but wonder if my appetite is feeding me impact bias, as Andy Stanley discussed. Daniel Pink said that we are motivated by our carnal desires, including money, but also the desire to do the right thing. My greatest fear in moving into a full-time position is that it will take away my opportunity to serve Camp Hope and the kids that I love with freedom. As I work part-time, I have freedom to take time off since I only get paid for the hours that I work. I am careful not to abuse this privilege, using it more for school and Camp Hope than personal days. I have a strong work ethic, so I often work more hours during a given week than I should, but I also know that I can take time away from the office to take care of my other responsibilities. My fear is that by moving into a full-time position I will become absorbed in the daily requirements and will not have the freedom to serve both my family and the kids that I love from Camp Hope.

As I weigh these fears, it is easy to assume that in order to fulfill the Lord’s desires for me with the kids from Camp Hope that I must choose either Chick-fil-A or ministry. However, Chick-fil-A is a perfect example of a company that works in order to serve God, and even the corporate purpose states, “To glorify God by being a faithful steward of all that He has entrusted to us, and to be a positive influence on anyone who comes in contact with Chick-fil-A.” Danny Wuerffel said, “Too often, people think they need to put their skills on the shelf in order to serve.” I completely understand what he meant by that. Daily I feel as though I am being pulled in many different directions after things that I either desire or need to do. I have committed to working at Chick-fil-A, and love what I do, but I can’t help but wonder if I allow it to get in the way of what God desires for me.

Both my hesitancy to go into the kids’ communities as well as my concerns about the full-time position are both driven by fear of something unknown or uncomfortable. Debra and Alan Hirsch stated, “God claims full loyalty over us; anything that stands between that is an idol,” and “To accept the one-ship of God is to give up all our idols.” That clearly defines that anything that keeps me apart from the Lord is an idol, including my comfort and fear of the unknown. Much of this is from the insecurity that dwells within me. Beth Moore asked, “Can you be dead enough to yourself to welcome any movement of God?” If I desire to experience what the Lord wants for my life, I have to be willing to step into something uncomfortable. Mark Batterson said, “We all want a miracle, but never want to be put in a situation that requires one.” He also challenged that ministry should be a bit dangerous. Seth Godin echoed his challenge to live dangerously, saying that “we bowl at work every day…avoiding gutters and looking for strikes.” I don’t want to live carefully! As much as I hate failure, I want the opportunity to fail, because only then will I have tried something new. I do not want to be able to always explain the things that I am a part of. Perry Noble said, “The greatest things that ever happened are unexplainable; and if they are explainable, they weren’t from God!” He went on to say, “God will lead you to a place you aren’t sure you should go, but are happy you went.” The discomfort of the unknown will lead to a place where I can experience God.

The greatest challenge from Catalyst was posed by Francis Chan when he said, “If you put your life in the Scriptures, what is your definition of weird?” I immediately began to look at these two areas of my life, work and ministry, and couldn’t help by wonder which was more in line with Scripture. Since that challenge, my brain has been continuously thinking about all of my desires to work with the kids as well as my responsibilities to work and provide for my family. At one point, I looked to Cris and said, “What does any of this have to do with chicken?” Over the past couple of weeks, I have also been wondering, when I meet Jesus face-to-face, will He be more proud of me as a Business Analyst or as a servant of those that have less than I?

Catalyst challenged me to review my commitments and the things that I place my time and efforts into, as well as the things that I have found ways to put off. I have a desire to love on the kids from Camp Hope and help heal their wounds, and I would love to be able to do so with Cris. I will continue in prayer, seeking after the plans of God, and pray that I have the strength to follow after whatever path He lays before me.

Let's Hear it for the Boys!

Ok...so I have a confession. I really enjoy hanging out with boys at Camp Hope, our church and just in general. They say the funniest things and they are just so cool! For example, this was a conversation between me and Gregory on Saturday:
"Mrs. Cris, what is your full name?"
"Well, it's Crisara Douglas Hunt but it used to be Crisara Lynn Douglas."
"Oh, what happened?"
"I got married."
"Oh yea, how is that going for you?" (Gregory is 16 years old btw...)
"It's going great Gregory!"
"So Mr. Marc is nice to you?" "Yes he is."
"Well Mrs. Cris, you know where to find me if he's not."
I would really hang out with them all the time if I could but I'm pretty sure they just think I'm lame. Anyway, this weekend was a packed weekend of hanging out with boys. On Friday night, Marc and I went to Friday Night Lights with City of Refuge. On Friday nights, they open up their gym for the kids in the area to come play basketball. The guys there were so nice to us - once again, would hang out with them all of the time. I had a little guy help me with the score board and Marc painfully stood on the sidelines watching the guys play. Next time he will be sure to wear clothes to play...including his infamous white tee and shoes. Saturday, we had an afternoon of football and ultimate Frisbee with some of our Camp hope guys at our church, St. Philip UMC. The day went off without a hitch except for one of our footballs getting stolen by a neighborhood kid. The guys played for 5 hours straight and pretty much wore out all of the adults. The boys always impress me with how polite they are. They kept thanking me for organizing them to play football and when I would ask them how they were, they always respond, "How are you Mrs. Cris?" Yes, I want to take them all home.Ok...just one more story about one of my all-time favorite kids from church, Ray-Ray. He was at our church last year for about 6 months and then after Mother's Day, he and most of the kids from the neighborhood left and haven't been back since. I heard that Ray-Ray moved, but he will always have a special place in my heart. Here was a deep conversation Ray-Ray and I had about his life aspirations:
"Ray-Ray, what do you want to do when you grow up?"
"Well, I want to live in a big house with like 25 rooms."
"Wow Ray-Ray, that's going to be expensive. What are you going to do to make money to build that house?"
"I'm going to be an engineer."
"Well, I hear GA Tech is a great college to go to if you want to be an engineer."
"Yea yea, but hey, Mrs. Cris, what is an engineer?"