Sarah

Sarah and Doug live in B.C. where the winter has been long and personal circumstances have been harsh. The death of a family matriarch, significant health problems for both of them, and recent lay offs have shaken their young relationship, their world.

Sarah is an intelligent, resourceful, nurturing woman. She works hard. She loves well. Despite the complexity of her day-to-day experience, she is an outward-looking, forward thinking gal.

It's natural, when times get tough, to become inwardly focused. We want to shore up our own resources and we can become greedy in our fear that we will not have enough. Sarah does not have enough. She doesn't have enough to pay bills and loans. She doesn't have enough to help support her extended family as they wrestle with their own dependants and employment cares.

And here's where Sarah looks like God: despite her own heartache, Sarah continues to give. Offhandedly, in the middle of talking about a particularly painful aspect of her own situation, she mentioned that a friend had been laid off and injured (in that order, thereby making job hunting an impossibility)a few days before. "So," she said, "we've been making up an extra plate's worth of supper and bringing it to him every night."

She said this simply, carelessly even. Our friend is hungry, so we're feeding him.

Her story. Her expression of goodness. I pray that she will soon have enough and that there will be people around her who can extend whatever version of a plate of food it is that she needs as she habitually, compassionately, selflessly continues to help her friend (and so many others).