So perhaps you think you can bring a big appetite while going on a ‘missions tourism’ trip, and gobble up everything in sight during your visitations. While it is rude to refuse food, it is also rude to be a glutton.
I was a little surprised when I was once told not to finish up all the food, but to ensure ample leftovers at the end of the meal. Think of the other people. Eh… what people?? And isn’t it wasteful to leave so much leftovers?
In the typical household we often visited, the family consisted of several children or even an extended community of cousins and relatives who had not eaten yet. All that food on the table very likely included their portion as well! You may think, we are being served our share while food for the rest are kept aside in the kitchen, but no, we often approach a buffet table (or sat down at a dining table) that appeared to be laden with waaay too much food! Our hosts bring out practically everything they had cooked, for our enjoyment!
And so, if we were too inconsiderate and stuffed ourselves all for the noble reason of not wanting to be wasteful, we may actually in our gluttony leave behind too little for the invisible extended members of the family, who might be anxiously watching us from a corner and waiting for their turn after we’ve had our fill!
A big fish for lunch
One of our favourite missions fields to visit is Cambodia, and since the beginning of 2009, I’ve shown up at the children’s home four times. We have two more trips to make before the end of this year.
Our missionaries there are two wonderful Filipinos, the husband and wife team of Noe and Grace. There was once Grace served us the most enormous fish I’ve ever seen. It was more than a foot long. It must be the grandfather of fishes and could feed forty guests, but there were just four of us!
We could try our best to finish the big fish (plus other delicious seafood dishes on the table), of course, but at the back of our minds were the nearly 30 children, the ones from abused, dysfunctional or single parent families, who live with Noe and Grace at the children’s home.
And so, we ate just enough to be satisfied, which meant digging a small hole in the big fish, and left it nearly intact. I sure hoped the children had a wonderful time polishing it off later!
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way to go sister, for your thoughtfulness, God above will richly bless what you do on his behalf.