Corona Devo 799

Can we do a kind thing today?

Maybe it will be noticed, maybe it won't.  

Maybe it will matter to someone...and just maybe, it might matter for us.  

Do you know a kind person?  A genuinely kind person?  You can spot them, because their intentions, hearts and acts are pure.  They are not bringing your garbage cans up from the road in the hopes that you will buy them a cake the next time you are at Costco.  But because their kindness and acts are such a blessing...it makes us want to buy them a cake, so we might.  

And even if you bring the neighbor's garbage cans up every week of the year and they never acknowledge it...keep doing kind things.  If we are doing them for the right reasons (to show others the unwarranted kindness of Christ/to serve as Christ served/to demonstrate God's love), then no thank you is necessary.  

(But sometimes it will come.)

Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.  ~Galatians 6:9

This verse does not promise a Rolls Royce to anyone who does a good deed.  Far from it, actually.  The truth is, as followers of Christ, we will give much more often than we receive...but it will still feel internally/spiritually/soulfully good to give if we are giving with Christ in our heart and at the root of our efforts.  

Ever since my children have been old enough to understand what I am telling them, they have scoffed at me when I preach, "Doing good is its own reward."  

But I actually believe that, and I pray they do too one day.  We were created by a loving God to love others and that includes doing kind things for others.  

It will behoove us to learn early-on that doing good for ourselves is its own reward too: studying/preparing/planning blesses us more than anyone else.  

But, we also never know when the good Lord (or a benevolent human) might be watching us as well, and in that case, we won't turn down a harvest if it falls in our lap. (Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.  ~Galatians 6:9)

Don't give up.

And we never know what that harvest might materialize as.  For Tabitha...it was her life.

There was a believer in Joppa named Tabitha (which in Greek is Dorcas). She was always doing kind things for others and helping the poor. (37) About this time she became ill and died. Her body was washed for burial and laid in an upstairs room. (38) But the believers had heard that Peter was nearby at Lydda, so they sent two men to beg him, “Please come as soon as possible!” 

(39) So Peter returned with them; and as soon as he arrived, they took him to the upstairs room. The room was filled with widows who were weeping and showing him the coats and other clothes Dorcas had made for them. (40) But Peter asked them all to leave the room; then he knelt and prayed. Turning to the body he said, “Get up, Tabitha.” And she opened her eyes! When she saw Peter, she sat up! (41) He gave her his hand and helped her up. Then he called in the widows and all the believers, and he presented her to them alive. 

(42) The news spread through the whole town, and many believed in the Lord.  ~Acts 9:36

Tabitha (Dorcas) had not made coats and other clothes for widows and the poor in the hopes of being "repaid".  From the verses, we can just tell that her intentions, heart, and acts were pure.  She certainly could not have guessed that her life would have touched people in such a way that they would lobby for  a man-of-God to come from another city to attempt to resurrect her.  She never did kind things for any of those reasons.  She just did kind things. 

Can we do a kind thing today?

Maybe it will be noticed, maybe it won't.  

Maybe it will matter to someone...and just maybe, it might matter for us.  This can't be our root motivation, or we will nullify the purity and Christlikeness of our efforts, but we also cannot deny or ignore that the Lord knows our hearts and sees our efforts.  

God is not unjust; he will not forget your work and the love you have shown him as you have helped his people and continue to help them.  ~Hebrews 6:10 

Not that we will do a kind thing today in the hopes of being "repaid".  And I pray that the Lord and others will "just be able to tell" that our intentions, heart, and acts are pure.  

(And He can tell when they are not.)  

Lord, cleanse our motives and our expectations.  Don't let us do kind things for any of the wrong reasons.  But help us to do kind things.  Amen.

Just like Tabitha.

Can we do a kind thing today? 

Blessings,

sarah

https://sarahsundy04.blogspot.com