But God, it's just five bucks!

Several weeks ago, the professor of my Missionary Life & Work class announced amongst cheers and praises of my fellow classmates that he would not be giving a Midterm Exam. As we were murmuring amongst ourselves, he lifted his hands to quiet our excitment. "In the traditional sense..." he added. With perplexity overcoming each of us, he explained his plan to us: We would not have a Midterm Exam that consisted of questions of studied course material or reflective essays of applied missiology principles. No, our Midterm Exam was to break into groups of 10 students and plan and execute a minimum 6 hour community service project here in Lakeland. "What joy..." I thought, "Exactly what I need to add to my schedule." My group picked a project to do and set a date to meet to nail down the specifics. For the project, we would visit a local park and clean it up as well as feed the local homeless population. Our meeting was set for Wednesday (Oct 8) after chapel.

As I sat in Chapel on Wednesday (Oct 8), the speaker called the ushers forward to take an offering. For those of you who don't know, every chapel, an offering is taken (we have chapel 3 times a week). All offerings taken during Chapel services are put 100% into missions, both foreign and domestic. For the past several weeks, I have been faithful in putting $1 into offering every chapel. However that day was different. As the speaker prayed over the offering, I pulled my wallet out. I didn't have a dollar to put into the offering. The only bill I had in my wallet was a $5. As the offering plate quickly made its way to my row, I had to decide what I wanted to do. As I saw the offering plate start at the end of my row, I put my wallet away, with nothing in my hand. That $5 bill was all I had for the next week or so (I live life on a budget, thank you). I felt I had given God enough these past several weeks in the mission offerings. Besides, it was just five bucks.

After chapel ended, I went to the Cafe to meet with my Mid-Term project group. We met for roughly 45 minutes, nailing down a set schedule for the day that we would do our project, writing out job descriptions of each group member, and so on. Then, at the end of the meeting as everyone was leaving, the group leader said "Oh wait! I almost forgot! I need $5 from every member so I can go buy all the supplies we need for the day." I rolled my eyes and gave a huge sigh. "You've got to be kidding me!" I thought. I begrudgingly pulled out my wallet once again, looked at my $5 bill and reluctantly slapped it into her hands. As I walked out of the cafe, I looked up into the sky and said "I guess You were gonna get it either way, weren't You?!"

That following Saturday, the group and I met and did our outreach. We worked for several hours at a local ministry called Lighthouse Ministries and then left and drove to a park where we passed out food to the homeless and picked up all the trash in the park. As I began to reflect on that day and all we did, I think sacrificing $5 was the least I could have done for those homeless men and hurting youth we touched that day. I found myself needing to repent. And wouldn't you know it, by the end of that day I had received $25 from various sources. Here I was complaining about having to give up $5 for something that would impact the community and instead God teaches me a lesson and blesses me in the end. What an efficient and humorous God we serve.