A life that actually happens.

I posted something on my Facebook, and I wanted to convey in my "share" that this wasn't just a story, but an actual human being that had existed. But when I read my words later I realized how much they meant to me.

"This life actually happened."

I know a lot of people that have lives that aren't happening.

They have dreams they aren't following, plans they aren't making, goals they aren't fulfilling and, most of all, talents they aren't using. Their life, as God intended it - just isn't happening.

Her name was Irena Sendler.
She saw something bad happening.
She felt she had to do something.
And then she did something rare:
She actually did something. (click link to see full story)
...But in 1942, the Nazis herded hundreds of thousands of Jews into a 16-block area that came to be known as the Warsaw Ghetto. The Ghetto was sealed and the Jewish families ended up behind its walls, only to await certain death. Irena Sendler was so appalled by the conditions that she joined Zegota, the Council for Aid to Jews, organized by the Polish underground resistance movement, as one of its first recruits and directed the efforts to rescue Jewish children.

To be able to enter the Ghetto legally, Irena managed to be issued a pass from Warsaws Epidemic Control Department and she visited the Ghetto daily, reestablished contacts and brought food, medicines and clothing. But 5,000 people were dying a month from starvation and disease in the Ghetto, and she decided to help the Jewish children to get out. For Irena Sendler, a young mother herself, persuading parents to part with their children was in itself a horrendous task. Finding families willing to shelter the children, and thereby willing to risk their life if the Nazis ever found out, was also not easy.

Irena Sendler, who wore a star armband as a sign of her solidarity to Jews, began smuggling children out in an ambulance. She recruited at least one person from each of the ten centers of the Social Welfare Department. With their help, she issued hundreds of false documents with forged signatures. Irena Sendler successfully smuggled almost 2,500 Jewish children to safety and gave them temporary new identities.

Some children were taken out in gunnysacks or body bags. Some were buried inside loads of goods. A mechanic took a baby out in his toolbox. Some kids were carried out in potato sacks, others were placed in coffins, some entered a church in the Ghetto which had two entrances. One entrance opened into the Ghetto, the other opened into the Aryan side of Warsaw. They entered the church as Jews and exited as Christians. "`Can you guarantee they will live?'" Irena later recalled the distraught parents asking. But she could only guarantee they would die if they stayed. "In my dreams," she said, "I still hear the cries when they left their parents."

The Snopes article was pretty fantastic too.
There is also a book on her work: Life in a Jar: The Irena Sendler Project by Jack Mayer

I'm not saying we ought to do something terrifying and dangerous and in rebellion to the government. I'm saying that if you have something you're supposed to be doing - stop being afraid and go do it.
Be willing to risk failure, foolishness, laughter, mocking, and being wrong.

In a letter, read on her behalf during a ceremony celebrating her efforts, Irena wrote: Every child saved with my help is the justification of my existence on this Earth, and not a title to glory.

"Justification of my existence on this Earth."

We tend to be under the impression that we're here to live our desires out. Make money, get married, be superficially happy, buy a cheeseburger, go see a movie. Then die.

That's what happens when you take God out of the equation.

Instead, if we put God back into the equation we can realize this:

You have a purpose.
There is a reason YOU are here.
YOU. The person you are with the gifts, and talents, and tendencies towards science, or medicine, or computers, or baking, or cleaning.
The Creator of all things knew that YOU were a piece of the puzzle that He wanted put together for a beautiful picture of His creation that brings HIM so much glory.
He knew that YOU would find fulfillment in following Him and chasing the fullness of His built-in dreams.

It's easy to esteem things; to think of them so highly and celebrate their worth. But, far better would be to live those things. Live. Go to God and live.
Why do I say "Go to God and live?"
Becuase you won't find that 'goal fulfillment' in following your goals your way. When you go to God He moves you in places you wouldn't expect, He delays you when you think you should go, He adds details you don't think fit, and He speeds things up that you think should take a long time.

In other words - He doesn't do it your way. He does it better.

I had plans for my life, I loved kids so I was going to foster. I was going to foster and foster and foster until I was one of those ladies that had fostered 117 kids and had a thousand and one stories.
And God moved me to San Antonio.
And God handed me Precious.
And God moved me to Colorado.
And God handed me New Kid.
And God.... I don't know what's next for us, but I know that if I keep listening and waiting - that my world will simply continue to be something that amazes me.
If I'd done it my way?????  I get stressed just trying to imagine it.

Go to God.
Live your life His way.
Be amazed.