A giving heart.

You go through life in a bubble.... hard times happen in the world, but never to you or your loved ones.
The horrible pictures on the news seem far away, far removed from your reality.
Life goes on day to day and you live your life in a happy oblivion.
You read your bible, you try to be a good Samaritan where you can.
You give money and food to homeless and try to be generous.
You keep love in your heart for your friends and family.
You work hard every day to have a giving heart. To be a blessing to those near you.
Every day you go home to your warm comfy home and live your life. 
You Snuggle up with the ones you love and watch a movie, go for a stroll in your neighborhood, take a shower before crawling in to your warm bed....all the little day to day things that you take for granted.
Then comes a day where your resolve is tested, you see friends and family left with out a home, with out a place to lay their heads, with out clothes except what they are wearing, without a place to work, some not knowing where their loved ones are.
You see broken homes and broken hearts.
These are the moments when you can have a giving heart,
You can give your time, your resources, your energy and help those around you.

The tornado that hit sooo close to home in Joplin has been a time where I have truly seen the giving hearts and goodness of people around me. My hospital took in as many victims as we could hold, staff worked all night to get them situated and have been caring for them since. I have seen so many volunteer that it was overwhelming. I have seen local groups mobilize and almost instantly provide shelter and assistance for the displaced. People have been caring for people and animals. Reaching out in full force. The amount of clothing donated was so overwhelming that they actually had to stop taking it! There is no way to describe to outpouring of love and grace that has been shown. Even today (four days later) the radio stations have gone from playing frivolous (but fun) music to being a place where people can call to give and receive information and you hear over and over the people wanting to help and volunteering all that they can. People are giving and giving and wanting to give more to help this community get back on its feet.  Scott grew up there and was blessed that his parents and other friends and family were relatively unharmed (aside from lack of power) and our friends were safe. I can only hope that donating all the goods that we could and putting in as much time at work providing medication for the victims in the hospital has in some way helped. It seems so small in comparison!