Good morning…
“Sue, thank you for your dedication to sharing God’s word through daily, practical devotions,” she wrote after yesterday’s post, Small Acts Of Kindness. “While your messages frequently align with my personal struggles and challenges, I don’t take the time to share how they provide comfort. This morning the timing was just too perfect. I have a close friend currently caring for her sister with cancer and her daughter (home from college) with health issues that left her anxious and afraid. Last week my friend lost her beloved dog (also to cancer)… she is relating much more to Job during this difficult season. We get together occasionally for lunch, but most of our interactions are via text or phone calls. This morning I woke up early and started searching for a way to do something tangible to lift her spirits… I found this on line https://www.spoonfulofcomfort.com/ and sent her some chicken noodle soup and chocolate chip cookies… as soon as I hit order, I opened my email and read your message. So I just had to share.”
“I see that God is speaking to us in stereo again,” another friend shared. “I wrote a FB post this morning challenging people to do one small, surprising kind thing, just because the world is full of small wonders and we are part of it. Then I went to my email and saw your post. Yep, God is speaking to us.”
“Sue,” another reader wrote. “For 40 years, I have packed my husband’s lunch for work. Included with the food, I put a scripture, quote, or a funny story. Tomorrow, he will get this scripture. Thanks for sharing this uplifting video and verse. Blessings.”
“It’s been fun thinking about kindness acts today,” another subscriber wrote. “I have always enjoyed finding ways to be kind to strangers. I just shared some hand sanitizer at the gas station. Thanks for all your posts.”
I personally enjoyed our kindness challenge too. Before leaving home in the morning, God nudged me to put in my passenger’s seat the Spread The Love Kit given to me by a friend a few months back. The kit contains the following instructions. “Leave these handmade cards wherever love should be found: on a public bench, in a taxi, or at the door of your best friend’s house. This gentle reminder – to love and be loved – will brighten anyone’s day!” As I drove through my day, I anonymously left “love” in the mailboxes of those God brought to my mind.
There are hard, heavy things happening in our world today. I am praying for two friends of friends on ventilators due to COVID and another who lost her mother to the virus this week. Others are battling cancer, addiction, or chronic pain. Some are anxiously awaiting the birth of a healthy baby, others are mourning a suicide, and still others are struggling with the ache of isolation. Jobs, lost. Connecting touch, lost. Regular routine, normal schooling, and predictability, lost. The uncertainty of the election outcome grows. A knife-carrying black man shot in Philadelphia triggers more protests and luting, injuring at least thirty officers. Our deep need for racial reconciliation is exposed once again. Certainly, there are hard, heavy things happening in our world today.
God’s redeeming love is the only solution. Our small acts of kindness are catalysts spreading Christ’s healing love.
Therefore, if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort in love, any sharing in the Spirit, any sympathy, complete my joy by thinking the same way, having the same love, being united, and agreeing with each other. Don’t do anything for selfish purposes, but with humility think of others as better than yourselves. Instead of each person watching out for their own good, watch out for what is better for others. Adopt the attitude that was in Christ Jesus (Philippians 2:1-5, CEB).
…Sue…
