support.

A common phrase around these parts is that people feel "unsupported."
As a fixer, a problem solver, I'm trying to figure out what it means to be supported, and what it looks like to support others well.

When I think of support, I think of a skyscraper.  Probably because I miss living in the city a whole lot, but nonetheless, I think of a skyscraper.
The weight and height of a skyscraper is extraordinary.

Before the 19th Century, the tallest buildings were tediously built, brick by brick.  Despite the amount of labor put into them, they did not rise very high.  Starting in 1891, however, skyscrapers were generally built with a steel framework, and more recently have become even stronger and taller with a new "tube" structure that dominates the construction of new high-rises.

This structure puts the strongest support on the outside of the building, and fills in the rest from there.

It doesn't usually matter what kind of hidden infrastructure there is if there isn't visible, tangible support.  I think that's what brings people to feel unsupported - it isn't visible.  That doesn't mean that support isn't there, but until it becomes felt for that individual it perceptively doesn't exist.  So what does it look like for a person to be and to feel supported?

I think it looks different for different people.  For some, they need verbal affirmation and agreement with their decisions and actions.  For others, it comes in the form of physical touch - when touched, they feel as if where they are in that moment is right, is good, and it reminds them that others are in it with them.  Yet others need to have the logical and the systemic, in place underneath them to know that they are strategically and missionally supported.

While the most prominent of those may be different per person, I think they all play a part.  For me, I feel supported by physical presence.  Be with me, and I'm more confident in what I'm doing because you're by my side in it.  At the same time, I appreciate the verbal so much, because it creates a memory, a line of encouragement that can be replayed over and over.  What I do know is that we all must work together and support one another in whatever ways we can so that we can create a structure that can withstand any kind of crisis.

If an architect can figure out how to make buildings 2,700 feet tall (Burj Khalifa - Dubai, it's a phenomenal structure...), we can, through the power of God, develop a support that will support these 22 girls and 9 big sisters.  We can.

"A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer.  Three are even better, for a triple-braided cord is not easily broken."
- Ecclesiastes 4:12