Split Brain

On September 3rd, Kristen lost her purse. She remembers taking it to Sizzler to celebrate Mark saving our tail in our business. While Greg was working on a big 4 week project, Mark had to do our commercial and residential maintenance routes for those weeks. He did a great job. We wanted to bless him with a meal at one of his favorite restaurants.

Kristen doesn't remember taking it home. She lost about $40 cash, gift cards, and her driver's permit. Sizzler didn't have anyone return the purse, so Friday I took her down to the police department to report it stolen or lost. We talked to a very nice police officer, maybe the Chief. As we were leaving, I had an idea. I had always wanted to talk to a police officer about the types of crimes on the westside. Don't want to go in blindly you know.

I asked questions about the gang names and types, how to identify them, what their habits were for violence, where they were from and where they went. Did the crimes happen mostly at night? What kinds of drugs were most prevalent? For about 10 minutes I grilled him and he gave me lots of information. Halfway through my brain split. One half was talking and listening about the westside, the other half was saying, "Are you nuts? Your 16 year old daughter is standing right here! She's already got a few apprehensions about her safety, why are you exposing her to all the dangers?" My analytical side took over. I reasoned, well, it's a good way to open up this conversation and find out what she's thinking about all this new info!

It turned out very good. She decided she wanted to learn martial arts to help protect herself. We haven't gone any further down that road yet. I let her know of some plans we have for ministry in that area and she was thrilled.

Do you ever start going down one road and some common sense, or conscience, or Holy Spirit or even the enemy shows up and tries to convince you to do a 180 and go in a completely different direction? Do you listen to it? Do you reason with it? Are you usually right or wrong? At 16 I think it was good to not hide the dangers we'll be facing on the westside. I want her to be fully aware. The police officer was kind enough to tell us how to tell the different gang members apart. He also wished us well on what we were doing. We plan to be partnering very closely with the PD.

May both sides of your brain have a blessed Tuesday!