Who needs marbles with these thoughts rolling around in my head?

I don't know how I can have any deep, meaningful thoughts lately.  Work is keeping me so busy (I'm not complaining, mind you!), that I'm doing a lot of the "standing at the refridgerator door trying to figure out what I was looking for," or walking all the way to the office, only to forget the very thing I needed to bring.  There are a lot of noble causes, mind you.  However, lately I've found myself with a lack of clarity in my daily life.

But my sons and I have had some amazing talks, especially about spiritual matters, and the role of christians in everyday life.  Here in the states, we are programmed to think that only ministers are doing God's work, and those in ministry are the only ones in God's will when it comes to serving God.  But who are ministers serving?  That's been the "rolling around" thought.  Ministers in the states tend to serve and minister to christians.  So who reaches out into the communities?  Churches have the tendency to become inwardly focused.  Their lives become full of being around other christians.  How many christians intentionally put themselves out there to be around non-christians? 

What if a church set up a table outside Walmart that said, "Such and such church wants to pray for you" and accepted anonymous prayer requests?  Then, they actually spent time praying for those request?  What if we hosted sporting events for the community?  What if we were really out there?  What if we used our jobs to minister to others?  To let the idea of doing a job and doing it well serve as a testimony to those around us?  What if we kept our word and did what we said we were going to do?  It just might be revolutionary!

But these thoughts haven't been just about adults.  The American church tends to protect our kids and try to keep them from the evil of the world by schooling them ourselves.  I've been wondering, though, if that is how we need to be raising them?  We often complain that our kids have no values, that they are too into themselves and can't think beyond themselves.  I wonder if that's because we've taken away the opportunities that would allow them to grow?  I think about seeds, and how important gravity is to their growth process.  The root part of the seed grows with gravity, while the plant part grows against it.  The seed actually needs resistence to grow properly.  Are we protecting our children so much, that we're taking away that resistence? 

I've not solidified my thoughts here, but this is what's in here. *sigh*  Sometimes it's just exhausting!