We Never Forget Kindness

“Give and gifts will be given to you; a good measure, packed together, shaken down, and overflowing, will be poured into your lap. For the measure with which you measure will in return be measured out to you.” –Luke 6:38

There is something wonderful about kindness. We remember for years kindnesses that we received, many unexpectedly, some a needed blessing, others true miracles. Kindness is not easily forgotten.

When you look back over the years, there are always small acts of kindness that you never forget. Random acts of kindness, often from strangers, that were God sent.

The woman who lost her husband in an automobile accident will never forget the $500 dollar anonymous check she received in the mail to help with that months rent.

The unemployed parents wondering how they will ever afford Christmas presents for their children won’t soon forget the knock on the door that Christmas Eve with gifts for their children from a neighbor they had never met.

The waitress wondering how she would pay for her next meal, who received an unexpected $100 tip from the most unlikely customer that day, won’t soon forget.

The relatives of victims at Sandy Hook and the others schools where unexpected and horrific violence took the lives of innocent children, won’t forget how entire communities rallied around them, pouring our love and kindness where the violence disrupted the lives of so many people.

Who are these people who mail random checks, leave large tips, buy Christmas presents for kids in need and rally around the victims of violence? Often, they are the people who themselves were the beneficiary of a kindness in their life, that so moved them, they decided to pay it forward.

Author Lily Hardy Hammond said, “You don’t pay love back, you pay it forward.”

[pullquote]I have given you a model to follow, so that as I have done for you, you should also do. –John 13:15[/pullquote]

Isn’t it time we all worked at paying it forward? It can be something very simple. We can donate clothing, give blood, volunteer, be a big brother, help a stranded motorist fix a flat, stop by the neighbor kids Kool-Aid stand. There are literally hundreds of small things we can do.

All we need to do is keep our antenna up, attentive to opportunities to help others, especially someone we don’t know.

Think back over your life. Have there been acts of kindness that you remember, where at just the right moment God put someone in your path that you will never forget? Remember, you can’t pay love back, you pay it forward.

You can be the person that happens by just at the right moment, the person that they will remember for a lifetime.

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