Act of Kindness

The alarm hadn’t gone off yet but I got up anyway and blindly walked down the hallway towards the kitchen. In the early morning darkness I managed to step on my kitten’s tail, bump into some pictures hanging on the wall and catch my little toe on the edge of a door. After pouring some water, grinding coffee beans and a couple colorful metaphors I readied my worn-out coffee pot for its daily duty.

The alarm hadn’t gone off yet but I got up anyway and blindly walked down the hallway towards the kitchen. In the early morning darkness I managed to step on my kitten’s tail, bump into some pictures hanging on the wall and catch my little toe on the edge of a door. After pouring some water, grinding coffee beans and a couple colorful metaphors I readied my worn-out coffee pot for its daily duty.

While standing alone in the darkness waiting for the water to boil I noticed a shopping list on the kitchen island. The neatly scratched note in my wife’s handwriting read “12-bags, 12-water, 4-tissue, 6-toothbrush, 5-sanitizer, 12-hats, 12-gloves, 12- socks, hard candy, $5.00 bills, shampoo, lip balm, sun screen, deodorant and something else I couldn’t make out what it was.

For a moment I thought she was preparing to run away but with $5.00 bills? Wouldn’t she need something larger for traveling money and why would she need twelve hats and twelve pairs of gloves? For several minutes the mystery bounced off and around inside my nearly empty cranial cavity before making the connection somewhere in the deep recesses of my brain.

Then it dawned on me that my wife was preparing to hand out emergency care packages to help homeless men, women and children. (I’ll have to warn her to watch herself around Wells Park and other city owned property in El Cajon as their Mayor’s recent emergency ordinance makes it a crime to help the less fortunate.)

The last time I handed out these bags for my wife I was concerned that I wouldn’t be able to find anyone to give them to. But after parking my car off Fourth Avenue in San Diego I barely made it three blocks before all the bags were gone. I think it’s the $ 5.00 bill that catches their initial attention and puts a smile on their grateful faces.

So right now I can hear all you critics saying “You shouldn’t give homeless people money! They will buy drugs and alcohol with it!” Great so let’s not do anything to help the less fortunate because we don’t want them to make bad decisions. Have you ever made any bad decisions?

This Christmas season we have a choice to give away our love or to be misers and hold onto every last penny like Ebenezer Scrooge. The choice is always yours but from my experience when you choose to bless someone else it always seems to happen that you are the one who gets the blessing in the end.

It’s so thrilling to drive around Alpine and see so many of you are now in full swing putting up colorful lights and other decorations around your house to celebrate the birth of the Christ Child. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if all of Alpine churches started putting up nativity scenes depicting Mary, Joseph, shepherds, animals and of course the baby Jesus? The ones with the three magi are cool too but in all actuality they didn’t come to worship the Lord until at least a year or two later.

Now as we have two weeks left to focus our attention on shopping for Christmas presents let us not forget the truly needy, hungry or homeless in our communities. I’m not talking about the professional panhandlers who hold up cardboard signs while flashing Rolex watches, nice clothes or a large Starbucks cup.

Also after leaving the grocery store or department stores listen for the Salvation Army’s bell ringer and look for the red kettle to slip a ten or twenty dollar bill into. These organizations are not fleecing the flock but putting your contribution to good work clothing, feeding and sheltering the homeless.

Random acts of kindness always make you feel good. Also pray for parking spaces and not prey on them as you’re out searching for last minute gifts. Support Alpines’ commerce too by shopping locally. There are many clothing stores, bike shops, gun shops, massage therapists, flower stores and many other merchants we can support right here in our home town.

So as all the consumerism, tinsel and flocking continues let us not forget the real reason we are celebrating this special season. God gave His One and only Son as a gift to save the world from sin.

“For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given; and the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.  Of the increase of His government and peace there will be no end, upon the throne of David and over His kingdom, to order it and establish it with judgment and justice from that time forward, even forever. “

Merry Christmas to all!