That's too much

I feel like a Price is Right contestant this week.

But instead of getting picked for the best game ever -obviously Plinko- I'm standing on stage in my "Arkansas loves Bob Barker" shirt (sorry Drew Carey) and trying not to be filmed in the same screen shot as one of the Barker's Beauties. The crowd is cheering me on while the announcer explains the rules of the game I have been selected for: "That's too much." 

Do you remember the game? You have to guess the price that exceeds (within a limit) the actual cost of the product they've shown you. And when that price is highlighted you have to yell "THAT'S TOO MUCH!"

I feel like that this week. 

We spent all weekend wrapping up our PRIDE training classes in order to adopt again and being reminded of the horrible things that some people to do children. Things that result in the short term solution of foster care placement, but also come with long term devastating effects. 

It's too much. 

Also this past Sunday, our church hosted Valerie and Louise from PATH.  An organization that fights to keep girls and boys from being trafficked as slaves for sex. Valerie and Louise are both survivors and shared their personal stories. I promise you this is happening in your city right now just like it's happening in ours. 

It's too much. 

Tomorrow night our church will congregate at the prison in Wrightsville for a night of praise and worship and some thoughts by my favorite preacher. We will join hundreds of inmates who are a part of the Pathway to Freedom program and learning to rehabilitate themselves with hopes of getting out of prison and not returning. I started to google how many state prisons where in Arkansas- and then the United States- and then how many incarcerated people there are right now today. But I stopped.

It's too much. 

Everyday I work with kids with disabilities like Down Syndrome, Spina Bifida, hydrocephaly, cerebral palsy, and cancer- and that's just on my part-time caseload. I even treat one little girl who had a stroke when she was four years old. She was sitting in her pre-k class one day last year and just stroked out. 

It's too much. 

Sometimes the world feels so heavy and I want to scream, "GOD!!!  Do you see what is happening? Where are you? We are killing each other down here. Make it stop. Come back already." 

I know the scriptures and the motivational faith sayings. I love  Christian song lyrics like the one that says "he gives and takes away." And I believe it, I do.

 But right now I'm standing on that stage with that long skinny microphone to my lips yelling "That's too much!!!" And the new car behind Door #2 isn't enough to distract me anymore.