Compassionate Heart

Today's Objective:  Go shopping for Mother's Day gifts

Departure:  9:00 am - this left me with only 2 hours to get the shopping done, go pick up pictures from Deanna, and get home to feed everyone lunch.  We cut out morning school lessons so that we could get our adventure done.  Plagued by a long list of stores to go in and out of, we took off!  We went to 2 stores and the bank and then we proceeded to sit at a light.  As soon as we got to the light, the kids noticed a homeless man.  We had seen this same man one other time and they briefly asked about him before, but didn't really say too much about it then.  But today they were excited to see him.  As I sat and slipped my hand up and gave a gentle wave, my kids were banging on the windows of the car yelling "HI!!"  The light turned green and the questions started:  "Where does he live?  Does he have a car?  How does he eat?  How does he go to the bathroom?  What happened to his house?"  I answered all their questions and all of the sudden their little hearts were filled to the measure with compassion!  "Mom, we have to give him some money!"  I told them that giving him money wouldn't really help him because alot of the times people who are homeless have a hard time knowing what to do with money, but we could feed him.  So the unanimous answer was to go to the grocery store and get him some food.  I stopped at another store before heading onto our quest and then they piped up, "Mom, he probably doesn't know about Jesus!  We need to get him a Bible!"  I told them that would be a great idea, but I didn't have one in the car to give him.  "Ollies!!!"  Carly yelled as I was approaching the shopping center - we quickly turned in and my babies bought the man a Bible!  (They are at the check out paying for it above)  We then went to the grocery store and got some dry snacks for him to eat and a sandwich.  The kids were so excited.  We wrote in the Bible that we could only feed him for a short time, but through God's word he would be fed for a lifetime.  We wrote about God's promise and Jesus dying on the cross to pay for our sins.  They were ready to go see the man.  We parked the car at a mattress store and walked across all the traffic (yes with all 5 kids) to get to the man in the median.  They handed him the bags of food and the Bible.  Then Chloe spoke right up and said, "Jesus loves you!"  (Now if you know these kids at all, you know that Chloe would never do this.....but she did!)  I talked to him for a few minutes and then we left.  I am so thankful for the lessons my children teach me daily.  They have such innocent hearts and are taking everything in that we teach them and then they are DOING!  My objective was to get everything off my list done, but they showed me that you need to stop and see others first.  I pray that their hearts never become hardened.  I pray that they will continue to grow and to know the love of Christ.  In preparation for VBS, I am doing an Ephesians study.  These verses came to mind as my kids were showing me how to BE JESUS!

Ephesians 3