Feeling Guilty.

Here’s what I hate: feeling guilty.

We had a marvelous time at the YMCA pool this afternoon with friends.  The girls did cannon balls and flips underwater.  I stuck my feet in and lounged on my towel chatting with a friend.  We ordered burgers from the outdoor grill and the girls got a twin cherry red Popsicle.  

The only sad bit of the evening was when Alexis dropped the last chunk of her Popsicle off of the stick and straight onto the 106 degree cement.  It was a red puddle in two seconds flat (not that I would have scooped it up and let her eat it had it stayed whole…well, okay, maybe I would have…don’t judge.)  In spite of the lost ice-pop, it was a lovely pool experience and we left wearing pink cheeks and smiles all around.

After bath time and tooth brushing and hair detangling, we were just about to snuggle up to read when Alexis declared that her hamburger must not have been enough food because her stomach was growling.  I knew she had eaten all of it, plus a whole bag of chips and over half her red Popsicle.  I did a quick mental inventory: she had had a far healthier lunch and snack in the afternoon, so I deemed her hunger complaint to be a bedtime stall tactic and dismissed her request for a snack.

We read and she fell quickly to sleep while I was only half way through the third paragraph.

I don’t think hungry children fall peacefully to sleep that easily.

And that got me thinking about hungry children.

You see, my friend Kirby is doing this crazy thing where he eats for a dollar a day for 30 days.  Yup, $30 for 30 days.  He’s actually done this before (and survived) and so this time around, he’s making it really interesting by going ‘round barefoot for the entire 30 days as well. 

You should read about it.  But, be prepared to have your heart pierced and your mind jarred by the words and images of what is going on in real life right as you are reading this.

So, while I was pondering this whole hungry child thing, I decided that I should pray about perhaps trying to live for 30 days on $30 worth of food.  

Also, since I hate feeling guilty, I began praying about what my response should be to this knowledge of how rest of the world is living. 

Here is what I came up with. 

1.     OPEN EYES.  Does feeling guilty make you want to shut your eyes and ears and retreat to your comfy couch as fast as you can?  Well, push through the pain of the guilt and go ahead and face the facts.  Read Kirby’s blog.  Look at the photos of real people.  Let the visuals sink in. 

2.     BE THANKFUL.  As I pictured my daughter’s pitiful patting of her tummy when she told me that she was hungry before bed, I again thought about all that she had been privileged to eat this day.  Then, I thought about all the options I have in my pantry of things that I could feed her if I were to wake her up out of her post-swim coma to assuage my guilt about her supposed “rumbly tummy.”  It’s true.  I have more food in my house than many people see in several months.  Instead of feeling guilty about this, I need to feel more grateful.  I need to thank the Lord DAILY and then share whenever I should. Which leads me to…

3.     SHARE.  Share when you know you should.  What do I mean by this?  Well, I think that we are all called to care for the widow and orphan, but not everyone is called to do this directly all the time.  But, you can certainly do it indirectly by giving money or your time or your expertise to ministries that do care for orphans and widows.  Begin to place caring for the needy at the forefront of your mind and priorities (which goes back to opening our eyes).  Then, see where the Lord leads you to give.  None of us are perfect at giving to those in need, but Christ is perfect at it and we can rely on Him to show us what to do AND enable us to do it!

4.     PRAY.  This is key to knowing where you should be sharing.  Don’t just pray a blanket prayer for all the starving people in the world—look at pictures of real people that Kirby has met.  Learn their faces and lift them up to the Lord who loves them.  In doing this, I think God will show us what our next action should be.  Perhaps it’s being a better steward with the food in your house, or giving money to a ministry (with just one or two clicks!), perhaps it’s going on a mission trip, or maybe it’s spreading the word (share the link to Kirby's blog on your FB page perhaps) so that others might open their eyes and share their own prayers and talents and finances with a hurting person halfway ‘round the world. 

I think that being thankful for what you have and asking God to show you what you should do (and doing it) is the all-time most effective guilt-killer.  Whereas, sitting on a cozy bed of entitlement with eyes tightly shut is a sure invitation for guilt to weave her nagging web around your brain. This leads us to eventually despise those who we are called to care for. 

So, maybe we aren’t all called to go barefoot and eat 3 meals a day on only $1, but, we are all called to care.  I need to open my eyes up and care a little more.  I also need to be truly thankful for what I have and be willing to share it…in whatever way the Lord leads me.  For tonight, it was simply sharing my thoughts with you.

What will you do?






*photo cred: I snagged the photo on this post from Kirby's blog. He's an awesome photographer.