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I’m writing this blog from thirty thousand feet, so forgive any typos or strange ramblngs from my oxygen deprived state. Yesterday was one of the hardest days i have a had in the 7 years I have had as a parent. I knew it was coming, but the foreknowledge did little to alleviate the nervousness I felt as I dropped my firstborn son off for his first sleep away camp. I know, I know, it’s not like I was dropping him off at college or anything, but watching my oldest son wave goodbye as I held back tears and silently prayed for him in my heart was way tougher than I was anticipated.

It’s a new experience, this whole letting them grow up thing. I knew as our children grew older that days would come when we’d have to let go of the reins and let them take their first steps (in leather boots, in this case) away from home. It couldn’t be a safer environment, of course. Teen Missions International is a 40+ year old organization that has been taking kids ages 7-19 on missions trips for decades. After having the opportunity to experience firsthand the phenomenal work they are doing around the world when I was in high school, it was an easy decision to let Noa spend a week with TMI once he was old enough. My head said he was ready, that he’d be fine, and that he was in the safest hands out there. My heart, though, man…..different story.

After dropping him off yesterday in the oppressive Florida heat and helping him get settled in for a week of tent camping, bucket baths, and warm koolaid to drink, I started really thinking about how, even though it’s so hard to do, how vital it is to the development of his manhood to let him have experiences like this one. Here’s the thing, he may be a 48 lb. kid with a missing front tooth today, but in 10 short years, he’s going to be a man. He’s going to look out over this big wide world full of decisions to be made and adventures to be had and I want to be able to release him with confidence that he will be able to navigate the tumultuous seas of young adulthood with a steady rudder. I can’t afford to wait until he’s 13 or 14 and then start the process of showing him how to steer the ship. I want my son, my danger loving, dream chasing, deep thinking child to be prepared to sail uncharted waters that will surely surround him as he grows into the man that God has created him to be.
It’d be an easy thing (and, perhaps, the responsible thing as our culture would dictate) to tamper his wild streak. He’s predictably unpredictable. Prone to toe stubs and skinned knees, this wild child of mine. No one would describe him as sedate or compliant, but I can’t help but believe that God placed those traits in him for a great purpose. How am I going to steward them? I can not afford to wait until he’s a teenager to start the process of teaching him how God can use his divinely gifted personality to serve a hurting world and share the beautiful good news that is the gospel.
Yesterday I dropped my freckled, reckless, absolutely impulsive 7 year old off for a week of missionary training camp that is anything but easy. He will be waking at 6 am every morning to run an obstacle course, eating foods that will probably cause his picky palate to gag, spending hours in the Florida heat learning how to build trusses, and learning how God created him for a mission and how he fits into the grand design of redeeming the nations.
As I lay in bed last night praying that God would send peace and courage to my newly-liberated-from-his-parents little boy, I was reminded that the stakes are high. Our children are assaulted from all angles with the fiery arrows of the enemy who comes to kill, steal, and destroy their faith. As their parents we must step out of our comfort zone and give our sons and daughters the weapons of faith that stand up to the barrage of fear and doubt that Satan will endlessly try to molest them with. We must not allow our fears to prevent our children from reaching their God given potential to change the world for the gospel. It looks different for each child and each family, but for me, for us, it meant sending my little noakea off on his own and it is good.
I don’t know what obstacles or challenges he will face this week. He just learned to tie his shoes, for goodness sakes, so I’m sure he will be faced with some mountains to tackle, but I can’t wait to hear the pride in his voice and see the confidence in his smile when next Sunday comes to a close. My greatest hope and my only prayer for his life and the lives of all my children is that they will love God fiercely. I know that in the end, there is nothing I can do to ensure the ultimate destiny of their lives. It is God alone who will draw them into relationship with Him. As a parent, though, I have been trusted with shepherding and guiding their tender hearts and I want my children to know that the most important thing in their lives is that they follow Christ with complete abandon and that they use their numbered days to make much of Him.

Well, sheesh…….where to go with this one……and what’s with the picture of my fridge?

I’ve started typing two or three different introductions to this post, but all of them seemed really inadequate at getting across the point I am wanting to share.  Hmmm…..it’s been such a long journey from the day I realized our excessive, self-serving, comfort-seeking lifestyle was a problem to where we are today.  Not that i’m not still excessive, self-serving, or comfort-seeking….far from it.  Just more aware, I guess.  See…there I go again….losing the point.  Ok, let me start again.

So…..it all started about a year ago in my mind.  I was reading my Bible one morning and came across this verse from James 1:27.  If you’ve spent much time in church culture lately, you’ve probably read it many times, but it says, “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.”   I mulled over that verse for days, wondering to myself if I was supposed to take it literally.  I know that sounds lame (FYI, taking the bible literally is always a good idea), but at the time I realized I faced two formidable problems in obeying that scripture from James, 1) I didn’t know any widows or orphans, and 2) I had created a lifestyle for myself and my family that didn’t leave me much time or money to spend caring for others. I knew it was a problem, but I wasn’t really sure how to handle it.  It was one of those parts of the Bible that I really wrestled with, because I knew that loving others was, according to Jesus’ words in Matthew 22:36-40, the second most important commandment, and if I was really honest with myself, I wasn’t really going out of my way to love others very much.  It wasn’t that I didn’t want to necessarily, but I had created a lifestyle that afforded me very little time to spend meeting the needs of anyone outside the realm of my own family.  What little extra time I did possess was spent with friends and volunteering my services to my local church.  Not bad things to do, of course, but I was starting to really be convicted that I needed to figure out a way to free up more time and money to reach out to the community around me.

Enter the book.  It’s by the talented Jen Hatmaker and it’s titled “7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess.”  If I was really web savvy, i’d post a link for you to buy it, but i’m not, so just google it.  Easy peesy.  To give you some clarity and save me some time, here’s the gist of the book, from the Amazon descritption:

American life can be excessive, to say the least. That’s what Jen Hatmaker had to admit after taking in hurricane victims who commented on the extravagance of her family’s upper middle class home. She once considered herself unmotivated by the lure of prosperity, but upon being called “rich” by an undeniably poor child, evidence to the contrary mounted, and a social experiment turned spiritual was born.

7 is the true story of how Jen (along with her husband and her children to varying degrees) took seven months, identified seven areas of excess, and made seven simple choices to fight back against the modern-day diseases of greed, materialism, and overindulgence.

Food. Clothes. Spending. Media. Possessions. Waste. Stress. They would spend thirty days on each topic, boiling it down to the number seven. Only eat seven foods, wear seven articles of clothing, and spend money in seven places. Eliminate use of seven media types, give away seven things each day for one month, adopt seven green habits, and observe “seven sacred pauses.” So, what’s the payoff from living a deeply reduced life? It’s the discovery of a greatly increased God—a call toward Christ-like simplicity and generosity that transcends social experiment to become a radically better existence.

Curious?  Interested?  Sounds crazy?  I was all three and more, so I read it and it was like someone had climbed into my head and put into writing what my mind was thinking…so convenient when that happens.  So, the reason I am sharing all this is because I want to invite you to read the book and consider doing a “7″ experiment of you own.  The Bean family (well, Austin and I mostly) will be spending the 7 months before our exodus from the military  pruning excess from our lives and creating more margin for seeking the Lord and serving others.  We’re excited/super nervous about this venture, but feel that it’s a worthwhile thing to do and are trusting that God is going to make much of Himself in our lives as we pare down these 7 areas in our lives.  There will be more blog posts about this as we get into it, but we’re “officially” starting with the food category on July 1st.  We would love for you to read the book, pray about it, and consider joining us!!!

Here’s a link for you to copy and paste if you want to check out the book……(it’s on kindle for less!!) http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1433672960/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=mutantmusing-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=1433672960

(And that pic of my fridge?  Well, for the “food” month of this whole 7 thing, we are going to choose 7 foods (and coffee….don’t judge) to eat for that month.  My fridge in that pic…yeah, way more than 7 foods in there.  Goodbye squash, coconut, oranges, sweet potato, almond milk…..i’m going to eat like a fiend for the next two weeks.

Extended family sessions are always challenging for me.  Besides the large number of people and the posing issues, it can be hard to not make it feel like a really kitchy wedding-esque family posing thing…..does that make sense?  I have shot different members of this awesome crew a bunch of times, but this was the first time everyone was all together and it really went super well.  I used a location that has quickly become one of my “go-to” places for morning shooting, and the 8 am sunlight was just wonderful.   Thanks to all of the Sawyers and Spences for getting out of bed nice and early to spend the morning with me.  I had a blast!!