Sammy Yammy and HoPE

During communion at church this morning while reflecting upon Christ’s sacrifice on the cross, I asked myself. “Would I be willing to sacrifice my life in that same way for someone else?  Sacrifice and suffer willingly for another human being? . . .

No, that’s too much to bear. . . . .

Well, what about Sammy?  Would I have done it for Sammy? . . .

Yes, I would have done anything for him. . . .

Most parents would do the same thing for their child, wouldn’t they?  It’s only natural, right? . . .

Can you even imagine a parent being forced to do that for their child?  . . .

Of course, God did it for His child . . .

Oh wait, that child is ME!”

After listening to my thoughts, I have a feeling that God leaned over close to Sammy, nudged him with His elbow, rolled His eyes and said, “Well, duh!”

The HPE conference is coming up in just 6 weeks. I’ve been working on it and planning for it for several months now. Due to losing Sammy unexpectedly in early January, it set me back several weeks. There’s still much to plan and funds to raise, so if anyone is interested in volunteering to help with planning, fundraising, or other tasks, please don’t hesitate to contact me!  Send me an e-mail message to Leslie@FamiliesforHoPE.org.  (If the response is good now, I won’t have to beg for help in a few weeks, and Steve will be so relieved that he won’t have to listen to me whine!  He says that whining isn’t becoming.)

For those of you who have known us for a long time, you’re familiar with the name “Aron”.  Aron is our “Little Brother” through the Big Brothers Big Sisters program.

In 1997, Steve and I decided that we wanted to get involved, and Big Brothers had just introduced their new “Couples Match” program.  The Couples program allowed married couples to be matched with a young boy with the hope that the married couple would be able to model a healthy marriage.  We were matched with 7 year-old Aron who quickly became a fixture in our lives.  Today, Aron is 18 years old, and we’ve been matched with him for 11 years!

Last night, we attended a special Big Brothers Big Sisters event celebrating Aron’s graduation from the program.  Even though he’s “graduated”, he’s still a very important fixture in our lives and has been a bright spot to us over these past few months of mourning.