Aaron Update: Wince While You Work

Aaron and Rhonda reading the blog posts. By the way, you're looking at Aaron's work station, his bedroom and his living room.















The kiddos watching Spirit, the movie. First day of school. Everyone's a little tired.













Rhonda won at Dominos. Again. The Dominos god loves her.









Aaron started back to work this week from his dining room table on the first floor of his house--his permanent residence. The first couple of days were sore, he said, but yesterday was better.

Today he is probably doing worse because we were over last night for a visit. As usual, we laughed our butts off and that usually makes Aaron's neck sore the next day. He insists that it's worth it.

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I don't know if the good people at Fellowship of the Woodlands read this or not, but I think a note of acknowledgement is due. This is the church who spearheaded the Katrina relief efforts in the North of Houston. They are a huge community church with many ministries. One ministry is the "Meal Ministry". Every day since Aaron and Rhonda have been home, some kind family has stopped by with meals for them. Yesterday, we (the Clouthier clan, too) enjoyed barbeque chicken, the best jalepeno corn ever, salad and deserts in the form of lemon squares and peanut butter cup cookies. Unbelievable!

Rhonda said that some meal ministry people work full time and still managed to bring over food for them. The food has been delicious, but there have been some hidden benefits:

1. Rhonda does not have to leave Aaron to shop.
2. Rhonda does not have to take time to prepare meals. She is literally Aaraon's arms and legs right now. That means going up the stairs for this or that, doing outside work, taking care of all the kids needs. The meals are a huge help and relief.
3. The Wiley family saves money. This will be more than made up for with doctors bills, but every little bit helps. That is a blessing.
4. The food is nutritious and prepared with love. A tangible version of caring.
   
5. Every day, they get at least one smiling visitor to wish them well. It is contact with the outside world and they love that.

Mega-churches get a lot of criticism for being mega-Monstors. Big, rich, self-serving and superficial where people are lost in anonymity, and complacency rules. Nonsense. Fellowship of the Woodlands may be a monstor but it does monster ministry. Like everything else, there is an economy of scale. People can find the niche where they can serve best. No one person gets overburdened because so many people lighten the load.

I love my church, but we just can't do that. We're small and geographically isolated. That prohibits some of the services that Fellowship of the Woodlands members take for granted. So, thank you to them.

Aaron and Rhonda are my friends and I love them, but I just cannot help them by myself, the way they need helped. I rest easy knowing that many loving strangers are caring for them.

I'm not a member of Fellowship of the Woodlands, but you can learn more about them here:
Vision
Mission
Beliefs
Practices

I believe that an organization is only as good as its leader. Fellowship of the Woodlands started not very long ago as the idea of one guy: Kerry Shook. Learn more about him.