My baby boy is spooning oatmeal into his face faster than I can say hot-hot! He’s sitting at our kitchen table that my husband helped me sand and my children helped me paint and he’s just eating instant oatmeal out of the pack. It’s not even the good homemade baked kind my kids are liking lately with blueberries.
It’s just instant oatmeal that I made in five minutes because I have an electric stove and a microwave and a refrigerator that is always full even when I say it’s empty.
My kitchen is nothing spectacular and it’s not getting featured on HGTV anytime soon unless it’s on a remodel show because usually all I ever see is what’s wrong. Like, how my cabinets are unfinished inside and need new doors and that my super-deep cast iron sink could use a new finish.
And if I had $16,000 to put toward a new kitchen, you can bet it would be something spectacular. I’m dreaming of gas stoves and soapstone counters and pull out storage in brand new cabinets and one of those really big fridges you can put trays in and an entrance straight from the kitchen to the deck so people don’t have to trek through my bedroom anymore when we’re having a barbecue.
But in Maubane, South Africa $16,000 can buy a kitchen for dozens of families and the orphans they’re raising. It can buy a roof instead of a tent and a stove instead of a fire pit in the ground.
It can buy a place for a community to gather.
It can buy a place where we can help save the future for the motherless and fatherless who are coming to know the one true Father and Creator of all.
Now, that’s a pretty spectacular kitchen.
Today won’t you sit at your kitchen table and join the online community who is helping make this crazy dream come true? I’m part of a team that’s writing alongside blogger Lisa Jo Baker, who champions moms to believe they can do great things at their own kitchen tables.
But this is more than a project to her. It’s a lifeline because Maubane, South Africa is her hometown, her kitchen table, her community. It’s where her father is raising another family of rescued orphans and where he doctors during the week and preaches on Sundays.
This isn’t a random group of people. These are people who are connected to those of us who read Lisa Jo’s words and believe them because they are a part of her story.
So, when you bow your hands with your children in prayer, when you wipe the spilled milk and the stickiness off that table, when you set it with everyday china or Solo cups, give thanks for the table you have. And maybe consider giving this gift to another mom who’s a lot like you.
A mom who wants to teach her children gratitude for the hard times and the good times. A mom who wants to teach her kids how to trust in the love of people because we trust a great big God to bring us together.
Sometime we’ll dance in Heaven about how God was glorified in the building of this community.
Or maybe before then, we’ll dance in Maubane, together, in the kitchen while we peel potatoes and slice oranges and give thanks.
There are so many fabulous ways and rewards for giving to this project today (or any day between now and Mother’s Day). You can click here to visit Lisa Jo and read all the details, but here’s a quick set of links:
Pure Charity: Give right here directly to the fund and watch it grow!
Buy a Vintage Dictionary Necklace from Krafty Kash and $12 goes directly to the fund. (Mother’s Day, hint! hint!)
Donate $40 and Money Saving Mom will pre-order you Lisa Jo’s book, Surprised by Motherhood, to be released on April 1, 2014 (April Fool’s Day, of course!). She’ll also send you her own great read Say Goodbye to Survival Mode.
If music is your love language, click here to order this beautiful album and learn to sing Jesus Loves Me all over again while supporting the building of this community center.
Finally, if you just pre-order Lisa Jo’s book right here, a portion of her proceeds goes directly back to this community because she knows motherhood is never short on surprises or encouragement.
AND if you leave me a comment telling me that you donated and why you’re choosing to support this community, I’ll randomly select someone to get a sweet little package in the mail. It’s nothing big, but sometimes you just need a new dishtowel, yes? https://www.purecharity.com/widget?aff=jwgo5&slug=community-kitchen-and-welcome-center&utm_source=9jpa6&utm_medium=widget&utm_campaign=community-kitchen-and-welcome-center
Lindsey P. Brackett 