The Blessing of Meals
Does Your Budget Include Giving?
Any healthy financial portfolio includes a budget for giving and/or helping people. The government even allows tax write-offs for charity. As a Christian, we give tithes (a tenth of our income/increase) and offerings (contributions above the tithe). They are considered charitable giving and we are commanded to do so, in scripture. In fact, a synonym for love, is charity. Read 1 Corinthians 13. Jesus makes provisions for the care of the house of God, for the ministers of God, and for the needy, by way of these acts of charity.
If Your Budget is Low, You Can Still Give
Yesterday, I wrote urging you, Don’t Pass Up Free Meals and by that was referring to the produce boxes that are being liberally distributed in many areas, during the pandemic. The giveaways are so abundant. Sometimes you may not always be able to take full advantage of them because you may not be able to eat the volume that comes in. Yesterday’s post contained several ideas of things you can do, to maximize as much of it as you can. Today, I want to expound on one of those ideas- chartable meals.
Who to Serve
If you have access to more food than you can eat yourself, that doesn’t mean everyone does. There are those who don’t have the ability to prepare meals for themselves. Maybe they are sick or disabled. Maybe they have a sick or disabled loved one that they are spending a lot of time visiting or caring for- because they are their priority right now. Maybe it’s a single working parent, who after a long day at work, comes home to help with homework, laundry, chores around the house and is just physically exhausted. Perhaps it’s an elderly person or couple who just can’t do what they used to do. And of course, they could be homeless and simply lack access to the means to prepare a meal.
Someone I know told me of a story about someone who gave a homeless person a free turkey around the holiday. Although they may have intended to be generous, their good deed was not well thought out. They had not considered the fact that most homeless people won’t have access to clean running water, a kitchen, and oven to prepare a turkey. I bring up this story to say, just because fresh produce boxes are in abundant
supply in a lot of areas (like here in Baltimore), it doesn’t mean everyone can take full advantage of them.
How to Serve
If you have the means to so, this can be a way God can use you to minister to others, to serve others. It doesn’t have to cost you much at all, if you are maximizing the use of the produce boxes. If you can do more and want to, you can dd meat and bread. It’s just a matter of looking for a few ways to be a blessing and help …a few ways to show charity/love … and then following through.
You can do it alone and drop off a meal or couple of meals to someone you know could use the help. You can partner with others if you want to do something a bit bigger. You can each make your assigned portions or you can work together in the same kitchen to prepare it. You could ask two or three other people to join you in making soups; label them, box them up in emergency foil blankets to help insulate the heat, and then distribute in an area of need. You can do stews, bean soup, spaghetti, roasted veggies with a portion of meat, a beautiful salad chock full of veggies, or anything Jesus lays on your heart. Prepare it with care and love and give it in that spirit. To go bigger, you can join with a church or other community organization so that together you all can serve a lot more people.
If you have veggies left over, wash, chop, and freeze veggies to use for charitable meals at a later date. Fill up your freezer with as much as you can. Get rid of old, frost-bitten food that’s been sitting in there for years. Who knows, you might have enough veggies to carry you many months and/or to afford you to serve many dozens of persons in need.
Don’t Be Discouraged
You will run into finicky people who don’t like what you’re offering; or people with special diets who can’t eat it; you may run out of meals when serving the homeless; or you may be asked for items you don’t have on hand. Don’t let those things discourage you from doing what you can. Grow as you go and keep going. We’ll look more at this in a future post.
Conclusion
I’m not advocating greed or hoarding- only recommending we store away in times of abundance because chances are, it won’t last indefinitely. I’m advocating that we think beyond ourselves to who we can bless. Hot meals and/or prepared meals are ways to help others, that take sacrifices of time and energy. If done in the right way and for the right reasons, they can truly be acts of love.
