Day 26 Sunday March 15 – [F] No snacks between meals all day
RO: I can’t see God right now. I feel so alone. // The key to seeing Christ in relationships is that power to be able to be vulnerable with each other. // Seeing Jesus in others is about being vulnerable to each other. In those dark moments of life – all those anxieties, hurts, fears – they really do keep us from seeing Christ in others. // How do we see Christ? What are those things that keep us from really seeing Him? // Lord. we want to see you. Teach us to show you our own hearts so that we can see yours.
2 Chronicles 36: 14-16, 19-23
Early and often did the LORD, the God of their fathers, send his messengers to them, for he had compassion on his people and his dwelling place. But they mocked the messengers of God, despised his warnings, and scoffed at his prophets, until the anger of the LORD against his people was so inflamed that there was no remedy.
Ephesians 2: 4-10
For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not from you; it is the gift of God; it is not from works, so no one may boast. For we are his handiwork, created in Christ Jesus for the good works that God has prepared in advance, that we should live in them.
Not eating is a struggle for me. I ate breakfast and a late brunch and by 2pm I was already finding it difficult to not eat. I ate dinner at 5:30 and even had a late dinner at 9:30 (everyone eats four square meals a day, right?) which is when Ryan finally ate his dinner. Even so I felt hungry.
And today I risked just thinking about myself and that I was hungry. Fortunately I remembered more about the larger picture than my miniscule existence. If I think I am hungry after just three hours of not eating what do people who are actually hungry feel like? And why don’t I do more to “feed the hungry”?
I have a blessed life of food when I need it. I have the luxury of going “hungry” by choice and can immediately end my physical hunger whenever I choose. Even during the night I looked forward to the morning when I would break my fast, but again I am fortunate in that I have plenty to eat whenever I want it. (Being too lazy to make something on the other hand when “we have nothing to eat” is just laziness… and hyperbole.)
It was a coincidentally convenient time for a letter to arrive from the Light of Life Rescue Mission about providing meals this Easter season. The message from God today was very clear and an actual message: “Turn this [F] day into an [A] day – Donate!”
For $2.34 I can provide a meal for a hungry, homeless person. How simple! How cheap! How can I not?
This Easter I eat in spirit with my less fortunate brothers and sisters. But I am doing it virtually and I know if I was in person I would not put a price tag on the meal – whoever needed to eat would eat – there would be no table big enough and God would provide me with the fun challenge to just give what I had for Him. But here I am doing it online and I have to pick how many (or more accurately, how few) I will feed. I can justify to myself that feeding one is better than feeding none, but I know what I do cannot be enough to meet the need.
But fortunately God knows this and He is not asking me to solve this problem for everyone. He is asking me to simply “do”. And if I respond to God’s call then what I am doing is enough – no matter how big or how small. It is not the degree that matters but rather the fact that “I did”. Because I am not alone in doing. I have brothers and sisters around me who also “do for the Lord”. It may not be everyone’s call to respond in this way because God speaks to us in many ways and calls us each according to where He knows we need to go. But I know this is where He has called me today and so I will humbly follow. God is the Light of Life!
Continue to Day 27
Give God Your Yes 