Friday, February 10, 2012

Teams and Toes...

I am sure as you read the title of this blog you are thinking "teams and toes?"  Huh?  Well, on my nice long 9 our drive down from Foya yesterday I had A LOT of time to think (dangerous) and as I thought about what I wanted to post this week-the importance of a team-a certain story from lesson from the Bible came to my mind...just stay with me here and trust me on this!

There is a passage in the Bible (1 Corinthians 12:14-21) that talks about the body and how each part of the body is needed to make the whole. You can't be just one big arm-how would you eat? How would you hear?  How would you live without a heart or brain? This is where the 'toes' from my title comes in...the toes can't say to the eyes-"We don't need you"-if it does and the eyes say "ok fine!"  The toes won't be be able to see where they are going and soon be lost or in pain after a  good stubbing!

This principle is the same for us here in our projects.  WASH can't say "Literacy-we don't need you!"  How will the WASH beneficiaries know how to read their hygiene lesson?  Our projects need logistics and HR to help keep our supplies moving and the hiring our staff.  Finance keeps on track-on being good stewards with what we have been given-trust me we have no choice but to work together as a team here!  Recently, we had two guests from our SPUK office come-and they said it best-every SP projects work together with one another-there is no sharp stop and start-everything flows together working as one.

Gordon and Roger from our SPUK office visiting a CMP Cassava farm-with the CMP TEAM!

Taya (red shirt) and WASH TEAM introducing Gordon and Roger to the community.

Gordon and Roger play a vital role in our SP body.  They oversee many volunteers in the UK -mobilizing them to assist with shoe boxes and in some cases projects.  We need Gordon and Roger to tell people in the UK what they have seen here in Liberia so that people can understand our projects better and then become a member of the SP team.

But there are more parts to our team...actual TEAMS!  As many of you know (and some have been a part of) we have teams that come and bless us in many different ways.  Part of my job is over seeing the hosting and planning of teams who come and visit.  This past month we had a team from Salmon Arm, B.C. come out.  4 guys, Casey, Matthew, Murray and Richard came and for 10 days helped build a new school.  Without them, the school would not be ready for next year.  Not only that, they were such an encouragement to our staff-it is such a blessing for us to have people come and teach new skills or just spend time with our staff and beneficiaries.  This team played a role in the bigger picture of what SP is doing here-they too are needed by the bigger SP Liberia body!

Team helping with laying bricks for the school


Playing team sports my whole life - I have been familiar with the team concept.  However, working with SP in projects here in Liberia made me realize how important and dependant I am on our team-that includes you by the way! In my training-even if I run alone I have a team behind me.  Someone watching my boys, making sure I am getting my fluids-or the staff that are implementing the projects that I am running for.  We all need a team to do what we do-so don't be a stubborn toe who thinks the body doesn't need eyes-you will just end up lost and sore!!



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