Shaking Your Bubble.

Monday, February 28, 2011
Shaking Your Bubble. It was about 11:00PM and I had fallen asleep just a few minutes earlier. I woke up to the feeling of my bed shaking, and at first thought it was a dream. Then I began to think it was possibly just a really close lightning strike/thunder, since it was supposed to be pretty bad stormy last night. Then the thought crossed my mind that it might be a tornado. After realizing there wasn’t any accompanying noise, I began to wonder what on earth I was feeling.
Just as the shaking stopped, I got a text message asking if I had also felt the earthquake. Obviously, the answer was yes, even though at first I didn’t know what I was feeling. I’ve never felt seismic activity before, so this was an entirely new experience. I have friends/family in the Conway and Greenbrier areas that have become all too familiar with the feeling of the earth shaking under their feet as of late. We just haven’t had any in the Cabot area yet, until now.
The news reported that the quake was a 4.7 magnitude, and its epicenter was a few miles north of Greenbrier. That’s a pretty good jump in mileage from where I live, yet I felt the effects. It was been reported that folks as far away as Memphis, TN and Tulsa, OK even felt the earthquake. That’s an even farther jump from where I live. You see, for a brief moment we all got to share in the fear that the residents of Faulkner County, AR have been experiencing for months now.
It’s a shining illustration of where my mind has been over this past weekend. We live in a bubble. So many times all we can think about or focus on is what’s going on inside the bubble of our own lives. When others are hurting, often we don’t even notice or care enough to help, because our own bubble has us distracted. We also, at times, begin to think that when we are hurting no one else notices outside our little bubble, and that we’re all alone in our condition. Neither of those facts should be true.
This past weekend 20 students and a host of adults at Victory Baptist Church in Cabot embarked on an adventure of hunger, ultimately raising around $7000 altogether to save lives in the world’s most destitute of places. We lived the reality of not eating for a 30 full hours. We spent 24 of those hours together, doing things that helped us relate to the plight of the hurting children around the world, specifically in Haiti. Our little bubbles were shaken by the quake of devastation that is being lived every day by those children.
News came to me Sunday afternoon of a student in our ministry that’s hurting in a deep way. He’s been hurting for a while, but now his pain and heartache have gone to an entirely new level. And it broke my heart all over again. His bubble that he thinks no one else feels or understands has been felt, and has shaken me to the core.
Those of us who know Christ are a family – one, huge, family – the family of God. When one of us hurts, we should all hurt. When one of us has a life-shaking experience in our bubble, we should all feel the quivering in our own. Those who don’t know Christ yet are hurting, and we should be sensitive those hurts and fears as well, and allow it to rattle our bubble enough to care by loving them. Our bubble should be shaking, friends.
Greenbrier and Conway – you aren’t in this alone anymore. Though my quake wasn’t nearly as dramatic as yours’ have been, I can relate to your fear now. My physical bubble was shaken enough for me to.
Hurting people – you aren’t alone, nor have you ever been. I just understand your fear and pain a little better now. I want my bubble to shake every time yours does. Because, after all, if we share a quake or two in life, the load gets more bearable with each passing step that we carry it together.



That’s just a thought, and I welcome yours.
Until next time,
blake

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