Kindness Steps In

Kindness Steps In

Ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it!

John 14:14

The message was posted on the Facebook page for women in our church one Friday. A single mom and her four kids had been evicted from the home they were living in and were desperately seeking a place to stay. They were hoping to enter a local church-of-the-week program the following Monday, which would at least give them rotating but regular housing, but in the meantime, they didn’t have anywhere to go over the weekend.

My heart broke a little, imagining the mom’s worry. How helpless would I feel in that situation if the roles were reversed? Each of us is only one action or accident away from facing a challenge like hers. When I finished reading the message, I forwarded it to my husband, as I often do when situations like this arise. Knowing he’d want to help, I called him to follow up.

After we chatted briefly about the situation, we hung up, and he immediately called our church’s leaders to say we’d be more than happy to take on the cost of putting the family in a hotel over the weekend, until they could enter the program on Monday. The fact that we didn’t know the family personally was insignificant. A mom and her babies had nowhere to go—that is the only fact I needed to know to move me to help.

Scripture tells us that when we ask for anything in Jesus’ name, God will take care of it. When we ask God for help, he hears and is moved to take action. As Christians who seek to mirror the character of Christ, how can we do any less? When we see a need we know we can fill, taking a few minutes out of our days or a few dollars out of our bank accounts to help can make all the difference to someone else.

—Kristin

— Today’s Act of Kindness —

Sometimes kindness requires us to simply see a need and act immediately—like carrying someone’s groceries to their car or rounding up stray carts in the parking lot. Be on the lookout for a need you can meet, and meet it without hesitation.