Ripple Effect

I have been thinking about my life and having a slight little tiny pity party for myself. I feel like what I am doing in life isn't making a difference. The other night laying in bed I was contemplating this thought as I have for awhile now and another thought came to me. Actually, a memory from my grandmother's memorial service last year. My uncle was talking about how grandma didn't think she was the smartest, most beautiful, or best singer in the world. She saw her flaws and not necessarily what we, her family and friends saw, a woman of great value and worth.

Grandma was grew up on a small farm where with her family. Later she worked the ship yard areas during WWII in California. She raised a family of nine (seven kids) on a shoe string. She was a wonderful mother, grandmother and friend. But she was eternally more than that. I had a realization about her and myself thanks to my friend Lara and her blog post from Saturday. You can read that here. It made me realize that we can't create world peace or find the cure for cancer by ourselves but we may help the person who does. Similar to Andy Andrew's (The Butterfly effect)story of Norman Borlaug and the person (George Washington Carver) who inspired the next, who inspired the next, which eventually trickled down to Norman Borlaug who won a Nobel Peace Prize for his work with genetics and wheat so countries who had severe drought and famine could grow wheat and feed themselves. You can read about him in his book "The Man Who Fed The World."

I say all of this because I trying to serve in our youth ministry at church and I am doubting if I am making a difference in the kids lives or even in the lives of the FFA kids and the volunteer work I do with them. I am not quitting on these kids or these two ministry areas I feel I am suppose to be in but do they care that I am there on Sunday's or that I am helping judge speaking contests or projects or what ever they maybe working on. After reading about all the people the Cupcake Kids helped on Saturday through cupcakes I realized that you just have to keep doing what you are doing even when you are discouraged or people try to defeat you.

My grandma didn't think she was anything special by the world's standards but she was outstanding in her faith. She made sure all her kids knew Christ and her grandkids too. She worked endless hours in AWANA and also in VBS with her church reaching out and caring for 1000's of kids over her lifetime. She taught hundreds of us kids to read and count in kindergarten and she even took time to help kids read in the schools reading program. Even after she had to move to Arizona for health reasons, she worked with kids at Sunshine Acres helping them read and encouraging them with love and kindness. Her ripple affect was like an ocean in some of our lives but smaller in others but she made an impact that will affect generations to come that may never hear about her.

Dorothy Elizabeth Jacobs was an incredible woman who loved me encouraged me through out my life. She taught me many lessons that even after her death I am still learning. It just took me a quiet night in the middle of a pity party to learn the lesson that sometimes you don't see the impact but you are making a difference, even if it is just one person.