Kids leading the way …I was fortunate to experience sheer joy amongst children recently. Their circumstances are totally different, but they enjoy life. It made me realise once again that I sometimes forget to enjoy as they do… too busy with the things in life without marvelling at the wonder of life itself.

The first group of children live in an area that is not affluent. In fact some of the houses there could be worth less than $500, but there are houses. Then again thereare houses in the area up to a value of $200 000. There seems to be a huge divide here with some people working and others not. The unemployment could be as high as 50% or more. Then there is crime around with family structures starting to disintegrate as there is no father around in many cases. Survival is the question in the mind of many people, but not in the mind of the kids.

There are frequent exercise groups and weather permitting we can have quite big classes. Normally we are indoors and we encourage the kids to come with the mothers or fathers. Sometimes we cannot use the facilities indoors as community based meetings will take preference above sports or exercise meetings. This happened recently and we moved the indoor training session outdoors for the kids to train and this was sheer enjoyment for them. There are youngsters around and they enjoy. This is the time to build community and to build dreams again. At the end of the training session we formed a circle and one of the group prayed for us. God touched my heart once again.

The other group of kids that I was fortunate enough to see was in a church service in another area of our city about 25 km away from the exercise classes described above. The group of kids were taught how to bake a bread. Explaining the recipe to the kids the teacher said that an egg has to be broken to mix with the flour. That egg can never be separated or extracted from the mix again as it becomes one with it. In the same way the children can never be separated from God and his love for them. The kids collected the offering and then went to a separate room to bake their bread.

After a while they came back to share this bread with the adults. There was excitement and a big wow. The smallest one was quite adamant that she wanted to share the bread and that adults could not just take it. She was on the arm of one of the leaders. The bread tasted very good and I was excited as I was offered another piece. It seemed if the response of the adults created even more energy amongst the children. They enjoyed this and thrived on the response that they received. They created something and they received  wonderful feedback. For most of them the dreams in their lives have not even been formed clearly, but they enjoy life.

It may be in an exercise group or in a church or sunday school class but the enjoyment is there. It reminds me that I am playing in God’s exercise group here on earth and that I want to share that enjoyment with others who are not in the group. It also reminds me of dreams and of creating things on my own.

So please join me as I pray this powerful prayer today:

Father, please rekindle the dreams in my life and give me a way to live them. Give me joy and the chance to share that joy with one person today. Any dream will do, but make it your dream for my life.

Amen.