just show up

Isaiah 58:10 (NLT)
Feed the hungry, and help those in trouble. Then your light will shine out from the darkness, and the darkness around you will be as bright as noon.

If you can't feed a thousand, feed one. --- Mother Teresa

Whoever shows up the most in someone's life wins the battle of influence. --- Matthew Barnett

Today was an incredible day for Julie, my wife, and I.  We are spending time this week at the Dream Center in Los Angeles, California.  What a great ministry takes places here each day of the year.  In fact The Community Fellowship is gearing up to open our own.  It will be called The Community Dream Center and be in Collinsville, VA, right in the middle of Henry County.  Here in LA they feed around 2,000 people a day.

The two ministries we served with were "Project Prevention" that helps families stay together and keep kids from going into foster care by providing food, other items and support to families.  We visited 4 families this morning.  The other ministry we worked with is simple called the "Food Truck" and over 700 people were served at the two sites we visited.

What makes these ministries powerful is the fact that the people from the Dream Center keep showing up and build relationships with people who are in need.  Most need food.  Many need support.  All of them need relationships like a relationship with Jesus.  By just showing up when someone has a need, we begin to make a difference in someone's life.  Show up and serve or meet a need.  Show up and have a conversation.  Show up and share something that is real and from your heart.  Give a little piece of yourself and love another person by just showing up in that person's life.

You might not be able to feed 700.  So, feed one person.  You might not be able to serve 4 families.  So, serve and support one with a little of your time.  Just show up.

God will use you to change a life.  One person at a time is where it starts.  But the most powerful thing that might just happen is your life changing.  The volunteers we have worked with are people like you and me full of a desire to serve.  Some of them come for a day, some for a week or two and others give of themselves for a year or more just to serve here at the LA Dream Center.  They don't receive pay.  In fact, most of them pay their own room and board to serve the people in and around LA.  What a powerful statement.

You don't have to pack your bags and come to LA.  You can start right where you are, even in your own house and neighborhood.  Find a need a meet it.  Build a relationship with someone you don't normally meet with.  Just show up in someone's life.  When you do, you are shining light in the darkness.  And that light in you is Jesus.  

Just show up.  You will make a difference.

Titus 3:14 (NLT)
Our people must learn to do good by meeting the urgent needs of others; then they will not be unproductive.