Love! What is it?

It was just another day starting out in our house, my daughter woke up then proceeded to let us know that she was ready to get out of her crib by her usual cries until one of us sneaks through the door playing peek a boo with her as we pick her up and then start our day. Afterwards my wife had gotten up and then came and joined us in the kitchen, but today started as last night ended, not on the speaking terms of positive people. Then the questions started of whats wrong, why the attitude, then the snapping at each other. Soon we became like two logs on the fire just heating each other up with our words. 

Really! Is this how husbands and wives are suppose to be treating each other, in a competion of who can say the meanest thing and hurt the other the most? I walked out of the house after another spew of word  exchanges and went for a walk. I then took out my cell phone and searched for a marriage hotline. Thank you google! I called and got in contact with a man named Joe. I shared with him our struggle and told him how things are starting and ending on a daily basis. He shared with me about what love is. He took me to 1 Corinthinans 13:4-8 you know the love chapter they call it? Well began to share with me of what love looks like when it is in action. Wait for it, wait for it, wait for it. You see, love is a verb and if I need to remind you that verb words are action words and if you still are not following me, well this means when you say something in a sentence like walk, running, talking, yelling, etc... you get the point. Love is the same thing. Let me break this verse down for you, "4Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. 8Love never fails." 

Wow! All of these four verses are verses of action. It seems that love is constantly working and doing something positive. Sadly, when my wife and I would argue, I had a verb, but it was doing the negative action. Joe went on to share with me that this is what love does and this is what I am suppose to be doing. You see I am the head of the household who is leading us to glorify God, but when I am not loving my wife then I am not leading us to glorify God. Joe told me this, "Chris, since you are a bearer of Christ, you already have love in you, but there is one who wants to keep love from happening and he will do it however he can, but you have to remind yourself of this, Christ is in me and I am in Christ and since that is the truth then I 'Chris' is patient, I am kind, I do not envy, I do not boast, I am not proud, I do not dishonor others, I am not self-seeking, I am not easily angered, I keep no records of wrongs. I do not delight in evil but rejoice with the truth. I will always protect, I will always trust, I will always hope, I will always persevere." So this is what love is? The crazy thing about this is that I alone cannot do this and just as Joe said that I have Christ in me so with Christ I can do these things, but it is my choice to do so and not anyone else's. Man, what truth to swollow and get humble real quick. This is up to me to be the positive action verb called LOVE, but I have to do it and no one else can. 

When I returned home I sat outside on the steps for a moment praying for Christ to go in before me and bring the peace we needed and then I proceeded into the house. My wife was on the phone talking to one of her friends when I walked in and I went and got my bible and a note pad and begin to write about love. My wife asked me where I went after a few moments and I told her I went and sat under one of the trees around the corner and prayed and thought about some stuff. We began to open up and love came forth. I shared with her about my conversation with Joe and told her that I was sorry for my actions and she said the same. We went through out our day which was funny, before the day ended we had a counseling session later on that day as well. So when we had finished our day I really felt that God gave us a fresh start in life and in our marriage. We prayed that night and let God back in that day. I see that as a man of faith I have some work to do on my end so that the action of love can be the positive action in our home and my wife can feel the love that God designed for her to feel as a wife and my daughter can see what it is like for a husband to really love his wife and for a wife to really love her husband.

Greetings friends,
I know it has been a while since I have been on here and posted any blogs. A lot has happened since my last post of me raising my funds to go to Ethiopia. Sadly I was not able to go, but as I always say, God has a plan.
Since then I was not able to reach the funds by my deadline a week later USCIS (United States Citizens Immigration Services) had approved our K1 fiance visa here in the United States. This meant that Hanna my beautiful wonderful fiance would be granted an interview for her visa at the U.S Embassy in Ethiopia. She got her packet and then told her that her interview would be on January 12th. A long time from October. Well today is January 16th and the interview has happened. Before I tell you the results of that interview, we had prepared and made sure we had everything she needed for the interview. I called my Congressman's office and had been speaking with John Wood. He had been awesome on giving me advise on what to do and not to do.

He had sent an email to the US consulate in Ethiopia that would be handling our case. On top of this we had been preparing for her interview. I went through and picked out the emails from the past year, my phone bills along with a copy of my calling card with the number I used and so much more. She had a stack of papers to take to the interview with her. When I say a stack of papers I mean a stack of them. The day before I pulled up questions that they would ask her and we spent an hour going over them making sure she had all of the answers for the questions. It was all in God's hands from then. She told me that she wished I was going to go with her cause then the consulate would be nice to her since she told me that they normally were rude with the Ethiopians. So I began to pray that God's kindness would be on the consulate and that God's confidence would be on Hanna. I spent the day praying and fasting for her and the interview.

Well at 3 am Thursday morning I got a call from my beautiful bride to be. She told me they didn't give her the visa. My heart just sunk and I began to question why, then she told me with a very excited voice they did give her the visa. I stopped her then and we just began to pray a prayer of thanksgiving. She told me afterwards that the consulate was very sweet and kind to her. Oh God you are so good. You answered my prayer and showed us favor. She told me how the interview went and she said she went into the interview with all of the paperwork ready to give it to her the consulate. The consulate was going over the application that I had sent in here, the U.S. She asked her one question that followed by another question and it was, "What does your fiance do in his spare time?" with no hesitation she said the answer with confidence, "He coaches!" Her next question was, "What does he coach?" and again with confidence, "He coaches football!" That sparked a conversation how the consulate loves football and then asked her where she got her hair done cause she loved it. Then she said to Hanna my wonderful beautiful wife to be, "Congratulations, you have been granted your visa!" As I write this I am listing Pandora radio and they are playing how awesome is the Lord most high by Chris Tomlin.

God how awesome you are. You have been so good to us. 406 days it took from filing to being granted a visa. God has been so good to us.

Whatever you are waiting on from the Lord hang in there. God is faithful as well as He is merciful.
Thank you for reading. God bless you!

Bringing Hope and Empowerment to Single Mothers and Widows in Ethiopia

Dear Friends,
I want to take a moment to share with you the last four years of my life. In June of 2008 I went to Ethiopia and Rwanda with Visiting Orphans. During my time in Ethiopia the team was leaving an orphanage. As we were leaving a mother of two toddlers approached us. She got on her knees crying as her children played around her not aware of what was going on. One of her children had only a shirt on and nothing else and the other had no shoes. One of translators told us that she was pleading with us to take her children with us cause she could no longer take care of them.
Sadly we could not take them with us, but we reached in our pockets to give her what we had in money and then we got out our donations and found shoes and clothes for her children. We got back on the bus to leave and as we did we seen her sitting by a ditch feeding her children what food we had to give her. I was heart broken over this. As we drove through the city I began to notice other women walking, sitting, and standing around on the streets of Addis Ababa. So I began to ask our translators about them. They told me that most of them were homeless due to their husbands left them, died due to HIV/AIDS, or the had been a prostitute due to their poverty.
I wanted to so badly to reach out to them and help them, but did not know how. I returned back to the states where there is help for single mothers who were struggling. My plans before I went to Ethiopia was to graduate school, get a better job, a nicer car, and a house. I came back to the states longing to return there and give all of that up to help these ladies find a source of income for them and their children.
I returned each year for the past three years with Visiting Orphans and this has kept this vision alive. During this time I want to share with you that the interpreter on my first trip that I had mentioned above is going to be my wife.When I shared my vision with her, it brought her joy knowing that I wanted to someday move there, cause she did not want to leave her country.
Now for the additional good news, I will be working with Mission Ethiopia www.missionethiopia.com & http://vimeo.com/25618178 that has started this very work. Due to the labor laws in Ethiopia they cannot bring me on as a paid employee or even a contract employee. So I will have to come on as a volunteer, so I will have to raise my own support to do this. I am inviting you during this time to ask you if you would partner with me. Here is how: First and foremost I am asking you to pray for guidance as I step in a different culture that I do not try to solve their problems with the mindset of an American. I am also asking you if you would take a moment and prayerfully consider a one-time donation of any amount or a monthly donation of $25.00 with$100.00 for the first month to get me started to bring hope and empowerment to these mothers. Send your check to Belmont Church Attn: Rob Fraizer 68 music square east, Nashville, TN. 37203 or you can go to https://www.wepay.com/donate/sendingchristoethiopia
Thank you for your prayers and your consideration of supporting me financially.

In His Loving Grace
Christopher Fisher