Service as Sanctified Sacrifice

A friend once told me he found he wasn't serving others as much as he would like, and he asked what advice I had for him.  The following was my response:

Find people who need help badly that you haven't served in the past - and give them the help they really need, no matter how uncomfortable it makes you feel at first.

Go to a nursing home and sit with someone who has no family to visit her.

Go to a hospital and hold someone who is dying of AIDS.

Go to a school and read to little children.

Go to a homeless shelter for families and give them small gifts outside of the Christmas season.

Go to a battered women's shelter and help teach them job skills so they can survive on their own - or just hold a baby so a mother can get away for a few minutes.

Exactly what you do is up to you, but find someone who normally would qualify as a publican, sinner, leper or Samaritan in your eyes and serve them until you see them differently.

Choose whom and how you serve, but absolutely serve - and do it at a time and in a manner that is a real sacrifice, including giving up something else you would like to be doing.