A desperate African man walks into a room of very content and smiling missionaries. He is desperate because he is trying to find a source for food for 300 school children whom he feeds and educates by donor support. They are content and smiling as each of them has just started in on their second slice of a variety of pizzas and the grease and cheese illuminates their smiles.
It sounds like a joke. It is not. It actually happened. The only person who did not have a pizza grin on their face was my wife. She ordered chicken. This aberrant behavior delayed the delivery of our pizza, but that is a story for another day. Suffice it to say, we were very hungry, or ready to eat at least and we did not openly display our dismay to the delivery man and certainly not to my wife.
As I went on to explain to the man that we were very short of support because of the economic meltdown, I was at least courteous enough to offer him a slice of pizza. He was deferential enough to decline.
I wiped the grease from my face, took a swig of cold Coca Cola and escorted him to the back door, continuing to advise him of the dilemma faced by Americans as they are forced to make decisions about downsizing their cars, cable television and even their favorite vacation spots. I assured him that we would take his request under advisement and find a way to help feed the children. He explained to me that the price of food had doubled over the last year, where it now cost about $50 to feed 300 children for a week, as opposed to $25 one year ago. I had to use my napkin to wipe. Not the tear from my eye, but the tomato paste from my mouth. Bad form to say no with lipstick.
One of the men in our group was much wiser than I. He promptly reached into his pocket and gave a crisp $100 bill to the man. He then went on to say that he would make sure we took this under immediate, not careful, later consideration. This, he assured our visitor, would make sure that the children ate the next day.
I gulped. It was actually a burp. Cold soda can do that when mixed with the thin crust pizza. I should have ordered chicken.
James 2:15 If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food,
James 2:16 And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?
James 2:17 Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone.