Massages and Milkshakes

We were treated as princes and princesses this past weekend!

At least.. I was, ha-ha! Sam touched a little on what day one was like, and I am going to touch on day two. You'll have to excuse Sam.. He misses some blissful moments sometimes (ha, kidding, bud).

So, filling some holes.. Last night, I was blown away when Gary dropped me off at the wrong host home. I say, "Hey, Gary.. Am I staying with you, or what?" His plan was to drop me off at the house of the Massage Therapist - - who was housing Sam. It circulated that my back was out of commission for the whole evening (even though.. we didn't do ANY work that night). It must've been that brutal 2 1/2 hours of driving that I had to endure. So, Gary insisted that I let her work out the kinks in my back.. So I did.

HOLY SMOKES it was legit. We're talking oils and a heated message bed. I was down in silence for a good 30 minutes, partly guilt-stricken for accepting, and partly basking in the gifts of God. : )

That's the thing about a lot of Christians. There's a tendency to feel bad about any receiving.. Sometimes, life becomes about giving, giving, giving. And although we give (and should never stop it), we must learn to accept giving as well. Imagine if you felt the urge of the Lord to slip a $20 into the hand of a college student and that person refused your offer..? Wouldn't that rob you of your blessing of giving? I'll never forget the words of my Youth Pastor. I told him that I felt guilty because my Grandmother often bought me suits and I felt that I had nothing that I could return to her. His response was very neat.. He said, "Some people are teachers, some are encouragers, some are givers.. We all have different ways of blessing people." In part, he told me that my Grandmother's way of blessing me was to give me things that I couldn't afford. He compared it to my sacrifice of time to lead others in song and worship.

That was the neat thing about Fort Lee. The people there bent over backwards and went way out of their ways to make us feel comfortable and welcome! They recognized that we had come to bless them, and in return, they wanted to bless us in any way they could. Whether it was massages, or last-second milkshakes.. They wanted us to be blessed.

Thank you, Fort Lee! We'll miss you.