Holiday Challenge.

Greetings. 

My fingers had dark red blood on them, and when I went into the crowded ladies’ room, no one even offered to help!  But wait, let me explain.  Rather profound insight, I believe.

Thanksgiving was over, and on what retailers call Black Friday, I found myself in a packed restaurant in Los Angeles, just looking for a little something sweet before we drove home.  Oh, we weren’t really shopping, mind you, we had gone to see the Christmas décor and be ‘in the mix’, after a very long, sad day. The only table available was a tall one, which of course, had tall chairs.  I looped my tote bag handles over one corner of my seat and sat down, though almost immediately smelled something.  Whoops, my bag had fallen to the ground and something had broken inside it.  Picking it up, I reached my hand in, felt the shards of thick glass—and brought my fingers back out, drenched in dark red blood, a lot of it.  

Instantly, I shot to the nearby ladies’ room to examine the damage.  There were four women ‘waiting’ just inside the door, with a clear view of the sinks, and my offended hand.  A restaurant hostess with bleach-blonde hair and fake thick eyelashes bustled in to refresh tissue supplies, and stood right next to me at the sink, but she only examined herself in the mirror—over and over—and paid no attention to my sticky situation.  ‘Seriously?’ I thought.  ‘You are standing there with all that tissue in your hands, and do not even offer to help me?’ 

Now, here’s the thing—I had not cut myself, nor was the blood red on my hands blood; it was nail polish of that color, that had been in the bottom of my bag.  But trust me, it looked like blood . . .

              And no one – not even one – bothered to ask or

                      lend me a hand.

Believe me, they didn’t look long enough to realize that it was not blood!

Clearly, two days later, I am still thinking about their apathy.  Why did they ignore my obvious problem?  Were they unaware?  Impossible—given our tight space.  Were they tired, like me?  Probably.  Fact is, no one offered a tissue or a hand, because they didn’t want to get messy themselves. In hindsight, it is still so disturbing to me. 

Here’s the point:  no matter where you find yourself this Christmas season – there will be opportunities to serve someone in need.  In the last two days, new subscribers added in—one from Bangladesh, another from Takoradi, NY.  (Christmas in Bangladesh is quite beautiful, and begins by going to church, banana trees forming an arch and marking the way to the church.  Takoradi is in the African country of Ghana where Christmas is indeed celebrated, though it certainly looks and feels different than in the USA!)  The point is—wherever we find ourselves in these next four weeks, there will be people out and about  … smiling people, hurting people, tired people, crying children … just people.

People who might need a hand, if we just have eyes enough to see, heart enough to extend compassion . . .

But expressing compassion usually costs us something.                        Compassion costs Time.  Convenience.  Emotion.  Sacrifice of some sort—might mean money, mess or material goods.  But Friends, you and I are called to be compassionate people.  The Christmas season is the perfect time to look for opportunities to show compassion.  Key word: look. 

Jesus told the story of the Good Samaritan in the Bible.  Mugged and bloodied, the man lay on the side of the road; two passed by, and looked, and kept on going.  Yet a third and most unlikely chap passed by, and he was the one who stopped and extended himself to the man.¹  “Now which of these three would you say was a neighbor to the man who was attacked by bandits?” Jesus asked.                                                         The man replied, “The one who showed him mercy.”                              Then Jesus said, “Yes, now go and do the same.”²

Do not leave someone with blood on her hands!  Offer to help.  In fact, I challenge you to give of yourself this Christmas season, by asking God to put someone in your path each day to whom you can lend compassion.  Perhaps a child is running to his mama in a store, and slips and falls; be the first to help him up.  Go on … I dare you: take my Holiday Challenge.  Look for someone—at least one person—to whom you can extend kindness each day.  ‘When you do it for the least of these, my brothers, you do it for Me,’ our Lord offers.

Christine