Hey everyone is Leslie Ludi host of the Set-A-Parl Encouragement for Women of All Ages.

We're going to talk today about the power of turning outward, getting outside ourselves

and living and others focused life. In our modern American culture this can be much easier

said than done. We may have great intentions about living an outward focused life

but in the busyness and the distraction of our culture it's very easy to forget about the needs of those around us

forget about the causes that are on God's heart and just be caught up in our own things all the time.

I remember a few years ago walking out of a grocery store in California and I was with

Eric and we were confronted by these women who represented Greenpeace and they were so passionately

talking about how they were trying to raise millions of dollars to rescue these

whales in a certain area of the ocean I think there were like 20 humpback whales that needed to be rescued.

And these girls were really just willing to give their life for these animals. In fact,

they had spent their entire Saturday. I remember driving back by that same grocery store about six hours later and they were still there

petitioning people for money and signatures and passionately talking about this cause that they had taken up and it was saving 20 whales.

Now while I'm not against saving whales, I began thinking about the causes that are

even more important to God that we as Christians should be passionately fighting for.

And that experience caused me to start wondering what would happen if I started standing for vulnerable children with the same kind of devotion as those Greenpeace ladies put into

saving those humpback whales.

It was a challenge to my soul, really.

I was grappling with the question, how passionately was I willing to fight for the causes that were on

God's heart was I willing to get out of my comfort zone and pour out my life for the

week not just in my head at the

convenient and easy, but in ways that required personal sacrifice.

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