Because We Are Blessed

I need to start this by saying that the Lord has blessed us. A lot. I know I've griped here about money slipping through our fingers (frankly, most people would gripe, too, if they'd had to pay 3 homeowner's-insurance deductibles in only 8 months and pay close to $1000 to remove a fallen tree from the front yard!), but you know what? We've been able to pay for all of it, along with purchasing a few small things that we just want. We're far from wealthy, but we're definitely blessed.

I mention this because realizing how much we've been blessed means I can't sit idly when I read articles such as this. A quote from that article:

America's Second Harvest – The Nation's Food Bank Network, a group of more than 200 food banks, reports that donations of food are down 9 percent, but the number of people showing up for food has increased 20 percent. The group distributes more than 2 billion pounds of donated and recovered food and consumer products each year.

Another article in last week's religion section also hit me hard.

Our local food pantry is in need of Helper meals (tuna helper, hamburger helper, that sort of thing) and meat to go in them. As our local Albertson's has Helper meals on sale for $1/box this week, I went in and bought a bunch of them. I also bought tuna to go with them. And because kids are home from school for the summer and not receiving free breakfasts and lunch as a result, I attempted to purchase the more kid-friendly options. Raisin Bran was on sale, so I picked up several boxes of that, too, as it's a filling and nutritious cereal. After purchasing it, I dropped it all off at the food bank.



I'm not telling you this to toot my own horn, but to encourage you to consider helping your local food bank if you have also been blessed. By shopping sales and using coupons, the cost to you could be minimal, and it would mean that local families who are struggling financially would have something to eat.