when they have "nothing"

this has happened to me so many times now that i can't even keep track.

it'll be an ugly day, or i'll be having an angry day, and there will be some stupid volunteer gig that i signed up for that i won't want to go to anymore, but since i signed up for it i HAVE to go, and so i go.

and then after i go, i always come out so happy and blessed. every single time this happens, i just think: "the people who you think you're going to go and help are always the ones who end up blessing you."

there's a soup kitchen at a lutheran church on 37th and chestnut that is there every tuesday. it's cool because they'll have bible study first, then dinner for everyone, then worship. bible study and worship are for whoever wants to go and stuff, and in all three times i've gone so far, there's always been people there listening to bible study.

today was pretty similar to most days, except for two things:

one, after the normal announcements guy, frank, was finished with his announcements, another man came and started talking. it sounded like he was usually there but had been gone for a while for some reason. anyway, he ended with, "thank you! i love you guys so much." and it sounded so sincere, and it was just SO cute. ahhhh. so so so cute.

two, a different pastor than usual prayed over the group today - a church came to prepare/serve the food, so the pastor from there (rather than the pastor of the host church, like normally) prayed. anyway, as he prayed over everyone, the "AMEN!"s and "YES!"s that could be heard were so frequent and so loud and enthusiastic and meaningful.

it's so amazing to see how people who go to soup kitchens - people who don't have the means to get their own food, people who have to beg sometimes, people who are going through just hard times in their lives - it's so amazing to see how these people are often the ones most enthusiastic in their prayers and in counting their blessings. it always opens my eyes to how little i have to complain about and to how much i have to be thankful for.

so to the people who were at the soup kitchen today:
THANK YOU!!!!

xoxo,
smiley sunshine