The Grocery Bag Project
(This was just a small project, but it meant something to me.  In 1996, I was co-leading Acteens, a group of missions-minded teenage girls.  Pam Light, the other co-leader, was a wonderful, inspiring Christian, a senior at Winthrop University.  During the summer, Pam became a summer missionary with “Touching Miami With Love”, working in a Miami Food Bank and visiting AIDS patients.  Our Acteens members were with her in spirit.  We asked Pam to look for ways we could assist.  She quickly saw that the Food Bank was chronically short of plastic grocery bags, so that summer Acteens collected grocery bags and mailed them to Pam.)

                                                                                      Sat., July 20, 1996

Dear Pam,

I know that Heather wrote you to let you know to expect the plastic grocery bags for the AIDS Food Bank.  I hope by now you have received the huge box full of bags, in good condition, and that these are already being put to good use.

This reminds me very much of an impressive science fiction short story that I once read in some anthology.  The story was about blood donations.  There was a group of people similar to the Amish, who tried to live life according to the tenets of their faith.  One belief they valued was directing their love, through service, to their fellow man.  Because of this, the whole community became blood donors on a regular basis.  During the time each was making the donation, he or she would be resting with the needle in his\her arm praying for the person who, due to an emergency or crisis, would have to be a recipient.  The prayer was for God to reach out to that recipient with His will, in peace and comfort.  One of the outcomes in the story was that people receiving this blood had a significantly higher rate of healing.  I honestly believe that each one of these little plastic bags contains a prayer for the person receiving food bank offering in it, this prayer not only from the Acteens who did the project but also from the congregation who responded so warmly to it on “Bag Sunday” July 14.  Our love and our prayers go out to the person receiving each bag.

And Pam, thank you for being there for them.  Also thank you for seeing a way that your Acteen group could contribute to your mission work.

                                                                                        You also are in our prayers,
                                                                                        With love,    Kay