Lifetime Goals

Recently I wrote about Mark Batterson's book, The Circle Maker.  I thought it was a great book, and one of the things I liked best about it was a list of goals he created in different areas of his life.  I took it to heart and came up with my own list.  Neither the Batterson list nor my list is the entire list.  Batterson's list is much longer in every area.  Mine is somewhat shorter mostly because I am older and because many of the goals I might have listed I have already accomplished.  It made me happy to think of all the things I had completed with my kids, so it was a good time of reflection.

Goals are good things to shoot for.  Some of Batterson's are a little out there, but he says you have to have some things that are beyond your reach.

Maybe this list will give you some things to consider.

Family Goals

Batterson

1.  Dedicate my great-grandchildren to the Lord

2.  Coach a sport for each child

3.  Pay for my grandchildren’s college education

4.  Take each child on a mission trip

5.  Create a family foundation

6.  Take each child on a rite of passage pilgrimage

Me

1.  Celebrate our 50^th wedding anniversary…and beyond

2.  Take my children and grandchildren on one of the legs of the Amazing Race

3.  Host a family reunion

Influence Goals

Batterson

1.  Write 25+ nonfiction books

2.  Pastor one church for forty+ years

3.  Create a conference for pastors

4.  Build an orphanage in Ethiopia

5.  Make a movie

Me

1.  Have 100+ followers on my blog

2.  Work on a church staff

3.  Start a mentoring group for women in ministry

4.  Run the Amazing Race

5.  Create a scholarship/internship program for students in ministry

Experiential Goals

Batterson

1.  Go on an overnight canoe trip with one of my children

2.  Drive a race car with one of my kids

3.  Take one of my kids to the Superbowl

4.  Spend a night in a treehouse hotel

5.  Learn how to snowboard

Me

1.  Help my grandchildren become lovers of art and theater

2.  Attend a retreat at a monastery

3.  Read the Bible through in 7 different versions

4.  Attend at least one conference each year about something I want to learn more about

5.  Teach my grandchildren to love experiencing big cities

Physical goals

Batterson

1.  Run a 10K with one of my kids

2.  Run a triathlon in my sixties

3.  Bike a century

4.  Dunk a basketball in my forties

5.  Hike the Grand Canyon from rim to rim

Me

1.  Exercise at least 4 times a week for the rest of my life

2.  Let my hair become gray at the appropriate age (to be determined)

Financial Goals

Batterson

1.  Be debt-free by 55

2.  Give back every penny we’ve earned from pastoring our church

3.  Live off 10% and give away 90% by the time we retire

4.  Give away 10+ million dollars

Me

1.  Live debt-free for the rest of my life

2.  Lead my church in a “Be Rich” campaign

3.  Provide support personally for at least 10 summer interns

4.  Give away all money I earn in ministry

5.  Invest in a business that brings jobs to our town

Travel Goals

Batterson

1.  Retrace one of Paul’s missionary journeys

2.  Stay at Old Faithful Inn in Yellowstone National Park

3.  Visit the Biltmore Mansion

4.  See a kangaroo in Australia

5.  Straddle the equator

Me

1.  Run the Amazing Race

2.  Go to Orphanage Emmanuel with Mary Reid

Sunday Homily

On Saturday we had people from the community come to help clean up around the camp to get things ready for groups that are coming in June.   It was a beautiful day, great weather for all the work we had to do.  It's very hot for May, 85+ degrees.  It’s hard to believe that a week ago when we arrived there was still ice on the lake.

As the work was winding down and the temperature was rising, the children in the group began to ask about getting in the lake.  Their parents told them it would be so very cold, but they allowed them to go in if they wanted.  Phil said the water temperature had to be in the mid-forties.  The dipping in the lake consisted of jumping off the dock up to about the top of the legs and then running out of the water.  After a while many of them were able to wade for a short time in the shallowest water.

You may ask:  How do they do such a thing?  WHY do they do such a thing?

Canadian children have endured a long hard winter.  Deep snow and temperatures of 40 below not including the wind chill.  There is a chance of significant snow seven to eight months of the year.  All that gives them a different perspective on an 80-degree day.  These days are not to be wasted; there are not nearly enough of them. Each one has to be taken advantage of and savored.  And so they wade in.  They squeal from the feel of the burning cold on their skin and the delight of it in their heart.

There’s a lesson in this for us too.  There are activities and opportunities that come our way.  They can’t be wasted; there are not nearly enough of them.  These days that God gives us to do the “good works that He has prepared in advance for us to do” can’t be taken for granted.  We must wade in.

For us the season to savor is our summer at Camp of the Woods.   The opportunity to be here and serve is for here and now.  There will come a time when we won’t be able to come.  So we wade in.  We feel some weight from the responsibilities we have assumed in our role here.  But the overall feeling is one of delight.  Delight with the friends with whom we are able to serve; the fellowship is sweet.  Delight, also, in the connection we will soon make again with campers.  I am beginning to see the names of those returning on their registration forms, and I can’t wait to see their faces again.

 

Another reason to savor this season is that it is a time of peace in our lives.  Currently we are not living in the midst of trouble or turmoil.  Life is good.  It makes me think of the “prayer of the week” from the book of prayers I read through.  This week part of the prayer said, “…Keep me from all things that may hurt me, that I, being ready both in mind and body, may accomplish with a free heart those things which belong to your purpose…”  Being free from pain gives me a free heart, one that can fully pursue God’s purpose.  I am thankful for this season to enjoy.

Jesus talked about this too.  John’s disciples came to Jesus and asked him why Jesus and his followers did not fast as they did.  Jesus told them,  “You don’t fast while you have the bridegroom with you.  There is time for that when the bridegroom goes away.”  He makes it clear that savoring and delighting in good days and good times is not just allowed, but expected.

Perhaps Moses summed it up best in Psalm 90:  “Teach us to number our days.”  In other words, “Teach us that our days are numbered.”  Let's make the most of every minute!

Wade in!

Crossing the Border

We are settling into our home away from home.  The trip was long but uneventful.  On Saturday morning we crossed the border.  There is always something intimidating about crossing the border.  There are guards, and there are questions.  Since we stay all summer we have to go inside and talk to the officials in the immigration office.  Last year Phil was called back into a room for questioning because of an incident in which he forgot to declare an item with customs.  It's always a little nerve-racking to say the least.  We crossed without incidence.

While we were driving the 502, I got to thinking about our crossing.  We were following all the rules.  We were not trying to violate any laws.  And we were nervous.  But what about those people who found themselves in extreme conditions?  What about those for whom smuggling became a way of life?

I thought about Irena Sendler who worked in Warsaw Ghetto during WWII and smuggled 2500 Jewish infants and children out of the country.  Here's part of her story:

"There recently was a death of a 98 year old lady named Irena. 

During WWII, Iliana, got permission to work in the Warsaw Ghetto. 

She had an ulterior motive... 

She KNEW what the Nazi's plans were for the Jews. 

Iliana smuggled infants out in the bottom of her tool box she carried, and she carried in the back of her truck a Burlap sack, (for larger kids). 

She also had a dog in the back, that she trained to bark when the Nazi soldiers let her in, and out of the ghetto. 

The soldiers of course wanted nothing to do with the dog, and the barking covered the kids/infants noises. 

During her time and course of doing this, she managed to smuggle out and save 2500 kids/infants. 

She was caught, and the Nazi's broke both her legs, and arms, and beat her severely. 

Iliana kept a record of the names of all the kids she smuggled out, and kept them in a glass jar, buried under a tree in her back yard. 

After the war, she tried to locate any parents that may have survived it, and reunited the family. 

Most of course had been gassed. 

Those kids she helped got placed into foster family homes, or adopted. 

Last year Iliana was up for the Nobel Peace Prize.... 

She LOST. 

Al Gore won for a slideshow on global warming."

You can find out more about her here.

We were talking about this and Luke told me about Brother Andrew who became known as "God's Smuggler" for smuggling Bibles into Communist countries during the Cold War.  He continues to work to bring Bibles to countries that are very restricted.

Another story recently appeared on 60 Minutes.  It told the moving story of Nicholas Winton who smuggled 669 mostly Jewish children out of Czechoslovakia during WWII.  You can watch the story here.

What great risks these people took!  What convictions they had!  It is amazing to me.  Thinking of the nervousness I feel crossing legally, it's hard for me to imagine what it must feel like to be working undercover, doing something that could cost you your life or your freedom.

The Circle Maker

I just finished a book called The Circle Maker by Mark Batterson.  The author is pastor of the National Community Church in Washington, DC, which is a huge church with extraordinary vision.  In the book Batterson explains his journey, focusing on the power of prayer.  He practices what he calls prayer circles which he figuratively draws around whatever he is praying about.  In certain circumstances he physically spends time walking and praying a circle around properties that he wanted to claim for his church.  His story is very powerful and inspiring.  Here are some highlights:

Best Question:  "What do you want me to do for you?" Jesus asked this of the blind man in Mark 10:51.  He's asking this of us too.

Best Desire: "I desire that the people who know me the best respect me the most."

Best Quote on Aging:  Seventy-year-old Harriet Doerr said, "One of the best things about aging is being able to watch imagination overtake memory."  Most older people allow memory to win out and they stop dreaming.

Best Statistic:  "100 per cent of the prayers I don't pray won't get answered."

Best Practice:  "One of my responsibilities as a father is not only circling my children in prayer but also teaching them to circle the promises of God.  Parents are prophets to their children.  And part of our prophetic role is knowing the Scriptures and our children well enough to know what promises they need to circle."

Best List:  Batterson's Life Goal List which includes getting to dedicate his great-grandchildren to the Lord, hiking the Inca Trail with his son, and writing 25+  books.  There is lots of good food-for-thought in this list.

Most Inspiring:  Quoting Daniel Burnham, designer of Union Station in DC, "Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men's blood."

A Weekend of Celebration!

This weekend was a big weekend for the Kiper clan.  We spent the day Saturday celebrating Will's graduation from UTC.  Phil and I were congratulating ourselves in our accomplishment...seeing both of our children graduate from college with no student debt.  I have told them before that they will never totally understand the gift they have received until they are putting their own children through school.  It gave me such an appreciation of receiving the same gift from my own parents.  We are so blessed to have been able to do this.

Will graduates with a degree in education.  He is looking for a teaching position at the present time.  He'll spend the summer working at the Ruby Falls zipline.  We are excited that he will be joining us in Canada for two weeks.

On Sunday afternoon we spent a lovely time at a shower for Kathryn.  She and Brandon will be having a girl due on July 4th.  Lots of friends turned out for the event, and the setting couldn't have been more beautiful.  It was so nice of Brandon's mom and dad to host this occasion at their home overlooking the Tennessee River near Blythe's Ferry in Dayton.  They received many beautiful gifts and are now well stocked for the arrival of our dear grandchild.

That said, we have had many conversations about our trip to Canada and the baby arriving while we are there.  At present we plan to stay for the duration and return in August to greet this new addition to our family.  Kathryn and Brandon tell us they are all right with this arrangement, and I think we are all in agreement.  I know there are many who would not make the same choice we are making, but we have given it much thought and are at peace with it.  Of course, if unexpected problems arise, our plans would change immediately.  We would all appreciate prayers for our family during these exciting and somewhat tumultuous days.