Living It Out

   This morning, out walking in the still cold weather, I ran into a friend out to check his heat pump and to get his morning paper. In the course of the conversation, we talked about the travel situations in Atlanta during the Tuesday snow in the South.

   He mentioned that Birmingham was as fouled up as Atlanta, but just was not in the news as much as Atlanta, probably because the Weather Channel was not headquartered there. In talking about that Alabama city, my friend also mentioned the story of the Chic Fil A store that went above and beyond the call of duty in helping stranded motorists. The story is here is you have not already heard:

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2014/01/29/chick-fil-gives-free-food-to-motorists-stranded-in-southern-snowstorm/

   At the end of the article, the owner gave this testimony of the "whys" of their actions:

For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat,” Jesus said in the Gospel of Matthew. “I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in.”

It was a Sunday school lesson illustrated on a snowy winter day along Highway 280 in Alabama with a chicken sandwich and a side of waffle fries.

   How many of us, those who call ourselves Christian, would have even thought to do that? How many of us even think that way?

   I'm sure the emotions on that snowy day among the people caught on that freeway ran the gamut, from despair, to rage, to frustration to most anything else, and that could have included the owner and staff of that one eatery. But they chose to serve, and that made all the difference.

   Difference in the lives of those who were served, those who heard about those acts of kindness, and those who were privileged to be on that serving team.

   I'm grateful for the fact that I ran into that friend this morning, and I am grateful for people who live out what they believe. Their example is a beacon in an otherwise snowy and frustrated world.

   The power of a chicken sandwich

 ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me.’