Viewing entries tagged
relationships

Selflessness

Selflessness is shown in action, not in word.

In today's society, selflessness is a word that seems to have been misplaced… but not in the world of Ellie Harlan. Ellie is a senior at Ashland High School who seems to embrace the true meaning of selflessness…

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These are my people...

On this frigid day, I found myself reflecting on the following stories and just couldn’t help but think… these are my people!

Several years ago, “These are my People” was a popular country song by Rodney Adkins. After today’s touching interactions, this song kept coming back to my mind…

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Gratitude

I just wanted to email a thank-you. There's a lot of stigma and judgement about the "quality" of people who find themselves food-insecure and it's often hard for people to reach out asking for help.

You guys make it easier by your process and friendly nature. While it's still hard to do (darn my sinful pride) it's not painful with your organization.

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God Timing

I had passed by the house so I could turn around to find better parking for my truck and trailer. The street was a busy one, so I turned just around a corner and parked along a side street. I crossed the busy street to greet our client.

As I talked with the client, I noticed that the person who lived in the house on the corner where I parked had cautiously peeked out and looked at my trailer loaded with fresh produce.

She then ducked back inside. I wrapped up getting fresh food to our client and headed back across the street to my truck. It was then that I felt the nudge...

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A Long Day

When a day starts at 7:30 a.m. and ends at 10:30 p.m., it is safe to say that you can count that as a long day. Fifteen-hour days can be exhausting for sure, but somehow, this fifteen-hour day left me rejuvenated, excited, and hungering for more!

Why in the world would a produce distribution take fifteen hours?! Why would that make me want more?!

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Beware of GOD

Back in December, I had taken my friend Gail out on her first trip to deliver produce. As you may recall, we had encountered a home with signs posted out front – No Solicitors, No Trespassing, Beware of Dog – along with a board spanning the opening of the front porch.

As you may also recall, I rather boldly stepped right over the board and knocked on the door. While we didn’t give away any produce, we had made a safe connection with a community member, and at the very least, opened the door to a possible future relationship.

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The Three "R"s

It would be easy to say that a produce distribution is about giving out food. We have it. People want it. Make the exchange, then get on with your day.

But, as God shows us time and again, that is not what our produce distributions are about. Our produce distributions are about three things: relationships, relationships, and, you guessed it, relationships. Today was no different...

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A Prayer of Blessing

As the point person for a community of people who are all seniors or have some sort of physical impairment...

the building manager reached out to Matthew 25 Outreach Center with a phone call when she heard we were doing a special produce distribution as part of the Minority Health Fair in Mansfield.

Originally, we had planned to NOT do deliveries for this event because we knew the quantity of produce we were scheduled to receive was much lower than a typical distribution, and this was a special event that we wanted to be present on-site for the entire time. However, when the need for food calls, we answer...

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Knock, Knock, It's Easter!

Richard was strolling by our truck as it was parked outside of a building we were looking at as a potential location for the outreach center.

He stole a quick glance into the back of the truck as we were walking back near it. We seized the moment and offered him food from what produce we had left in the truck...

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Walter's Big Heart

Walter is 47 years old. He lives with an elderly woman who has befriended him. He has never had a driver’s license, and as a result rides his bike everywhere he goes.

Today, Walter rode more than a couple miles on this rusty old bike of his in order to get fresh produce. It was 15 degrees outside, and the wind-chill was pretty steady around 0 degrees...

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Why We Do What We Do

It was Gail’s first time helping. She was a willing servant, but also a busy business owner.

She had carved out time to come help, and even offered her truck for doing home deliveries. Gail is a good friend, and I was looking forward to having the chance to show her why we liked doing what we do when we deliver produce door to door...

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Prayer on the Porch

We approached a home that we had delivered to the previous month.

We knew they had need, and that there was a very large family living in the home. When we rang the doorbell, we were greeted with familiarity. However, there was a tone of sadness. The young girl informed us that her step-dad had just learned of his brother’s death that morning...

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Home Deliveries? Are you sure?

We were only in our second month of produce distributions, and we had quickly learned that home delivery would be our niche...

However, we had to convince the people in the community that we were trustworthy and would be here to stay. Across the board, we were initially greeted with great caution. More accurately, suspicion.

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