I believe in global consciousness.

I believe in giving and praying for those in need in our world.  God commands it. (Hebrews 13:3)

I am saddened by the suffering that I see on the news and in the paper and on the internet, and I care.

But sometimes it is overwhelming.

I listen, and I am so caught up in what is happening across the globe that I become paralyzed in my helplessness to fix it.  I anguish and I am guilt ridden by my inability. What I can do seems like so little, the proverbial ‘drop in the bucket’.

And I forget

that my neighbor next door is sick and in need of assistance.

There is a child in my neighborhood who needs a mentor or a sandwich.

The elderly in my local nursing home need companionship. 

A young mother needs respite.

Someone I know needs a call or a card of encouragement.

These are needs that are close to me, that I can meet.  This is where God, in His wisdom, placed me.  This is my arena of service.

Attending to needs close by doesn’t mean that I cease to care about the world.  It does mean that I actively serve where I am while still placing my drops in the bucket.  While continuing to pray.  While continuing to support those who can go.

I cannot allow myself to become so paralyzed that my eyes no longer see the hurt and the need right here where I am.  What I hold is my five loaves and two fishes of offering to Him. He can multiply, and He can hear the heart cries of the world.

God has placed me here, and there is work to do.

God help me to be faithful!

Mark 6: ³⁵ And when the day was now far spent, his disciples came unto him, and said, This is a desert place, and now the time is far passed:
³⁶ Send them away, that they may go into the country round about, and into the villages, and buy themselves bread: for they have nothing to eat.
³⁷ He answered and said unto them, Give ye them to eat. And they say unto him, Shall we go and buy two hundred pennyworth of bread, and give them to eat?
³⁸ He saith unto them, How many loaves have ye? go and see. And when they knew, they say, Five, and two fishes.
³⁹ And he commanded them to make all sit down by companies upon the green grass.
⁴⁰ And they sat down in ranks, by hundreds, and by fifties.
⁴¹ And when he had taken the five loaves and the two fishes, he looked up to heaven, and blessed, and brake the loaves, and gave them to his disciples to set before them; and the two fishes divided he among them all.
⁴² And they did all eat, and were filled.

Hebrews 13: ³ Remember them that are in bonds, as bound with them; and them which suffer adversity, as being yourselves also in the body.

Galatians 6:2 Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ.