Tag: God

Helping one can help many

Jennifred Jones

Yesterday, at church, our pastor prayed for all the people hurt or affected in any way by the recent horrific earthquake in Nepal.

Today as I looked at pictures of distraught people desperately looking for missing members of their families, I remembered several Asian Indians who own the gas station in my neighborhood. I have met and talked with them at other times and knew they had family over in that area, and the thought came that I should check about their families.

When I asked if his family was alright, the owner said, “Yes, thank God!” I was immediately relieved, but noticed the look of gravity on his face because of the effect on their home country land.

Returning home, I thought, “I cannot go over there and help physically, I know of no immediate way to get relief to the region, what can I do to help?”

Besides praying for them, the thought occurred to bake something and take to them as a small tangible token of compassion and care on my behalf for them and their suffering people.

They like spicy foods, so my cranberry-orange scones sounded like a good recipe to use, and I took them back to the gas station while they were still warm from the oven, and hoped there wouldn’t be anybody in line… so I could talk to them.

The store looked empty inside and I handed him my cranberry scone gift and told him that since I couldn’t go over there to help and didn’t know what else to do to ease the suffering, I was giving them this small token to let them know I cared about them and their people.

It was a heartfelt moment between two people, two different nationalities, bonding as fellow human beings with like concerns about family, life, suffering and compassion.

He was touched, I felt like crying just from the emotion of the moment, and as I turned to leave, I noticed a line of people had come in behind me, no doubt observing the whole thing. I tried quietly to get out the door.

It was back to business as usual.

Only the love of God can cause something beautiful to come from something ugly like an earthquake.

…just a do-gooder?

Jennifred Jones

How many times growing up when somebody attempted to do something nice for someone, say something nice to someone or actually did something nice for someone, were they accused of being a ‘do-gooder’. Today it is called ‘sucking-up’.

Since no one wants to be called names or accused of the above terms, many, many people with good intentions do nothing…absolutely nothing. And nothing good comes out of it.

I have been accused of being a ‘do-gooder’. I have let the fear of false accusations stop me from doing good, from helping others, from doing what I felt (knew) was right, because I was afraid of others calling me names.

There are many accusers trying to prevent others from doing good. In actuality, if the accusers had someone do something really good for them, they probably would change their tune. But the ole’ fear of what others might think or say holds many back.

The older I get, and the more pain and suffering I see, the more I realize the need to silence those fears, expose them for what they are and begin doing as much good as possible. We are each only given so much time on this earth… and there are a lot of needs … many hurting people, hurting in all kinds of unimaginable ways…hurting quietly, hoping no one will hear them cry. Are we going to continue to let them hurt when we can help them?

All it takes is to be on the lookout for ways in our everyday life to say, Hi, to be friendly to the cashier, or the old man behind us in line, to holler across the street at the neighbor and ask how they’re doing, to look our young people in the eye, smile at them and talk to them with interest, just show them somebody cares.

Don’t be afraid of being called a ‘do-gooder’ or a ‘suck-up’. Go out there and get busy doing as much good as you can.

Prove the accuser wrong…you’re doing good because people need to have good done to them.

Dissolve the accuser’s accusations by doing good– even to them!

Antidote for People-Pain

Jennifred Jones

There is a cure, a genuine–yes it will work–cure for people-pain. It is not easy to take, but after you start taking it, it becomes easier and easier and you begin to feel better and better!!!….literally you will FEEL BETTER!

I don’t know how it works, but it does…actually it’s because we’re wired that way, by God Himself Who knows just what we need.

Who would have thought…it goes contrary to all popular opinion and human reason. Yet it will work.

What is it?

Do something good for somebody…anybody, it doesn’t matter if it’s the one who hurt you…sometimes that person is long gone, perhaps even died, but we can still do good to someone and watch how it transforms us and others.

If we can just remember that– it will save us a lot of sorrow, grief and wasted time!

Instead of returning evil for evil, bad for bad, trying to get even, we start a new trend to conquer the bad, by doing something good!

If you’ve had a lot of bad done to you, or even seen a lot of bad done, you can change the temperature in your world just by doing something good….a smile, holding the door open for someone…(ladies there is nothing wrong with us holding the door open for a man), letting another driver go in front of you in traffic, baking muffins for your neighbor, writing a letter of encouragement, calling grandmother, even pulling a weed out of your neighbors sidewalk!

Doing good overcomes bad. Doing good multiplies good. Doing good makes you feel good, and there is nothing wrong with feeling good about doing good.

We were not made to feel miserable, but to have joy, peace and happiness in our lives. It begins and continues by doing good.