There are few times in my life that I’ve felt more loved than after Ty and I welcomed our daughter, Tilly. Not just the love that a new life can bring, but the love that came from the world outside our little bubble.

Twice a week for two and a half months, warm meals arrived at our house, graciously prepared – or ordered – by the hands of the people in our life. I know it wasn’t all for the sake of helping two floundering first-time parents. Our church family and friends will do just about anything for an opportunity to hold a newborn baby.

But in those months, I learned the power of a warm meal. It was more nourishment than just food, and since then, I’ve eagerly signed up to carry new meals to other firsttime parents because of what those meals once meant to me.

In “Journey to the Heart,” a collection of daily meditations by Melody Beattie, she writes, “You want to be a force for good in the world. Many of us believe deeply in healing, service and love. But until you know what heals and helps you, what the truth is for you, you won’t know what heals and helps others.”

A meal is such a simple act of service.

There are most definitely people in the world who do far greater good. But I won’t discredit a warm meal either.

A friend of mine recently emailed seeking volunteers to bring meals to children at Community Renewal Friendship Houses in the Highland neighborhood. In her volunteering through Community Renewal, she’d learned that many of the children leave the Friendship Houses’ after-school programs to go home and not be fed until the following morning at school.

My initial reaction was shock. How could this be? I live just down the street from these Friendship Houses. I pass children walking to school in the Highland neighborhood every weekday as I drive my daughter to daycare. I see children playing in this neighborhood on my way to church each Sunday. My church houses the largest food pantry in our area, but somehow I didn’t realize that kind of hunger truly existed in my world. I’d missed the big picture.

I wrote my friend back and said I was in, and as my turn came to deliver a meal, I began to feel the gravity of it all. What seemed like a simple act of service to me was sustenance to someone else. The provided meals that blessed me during a transitional time in my life were a luxury. These meals were livelihood.

As I stood in my kitchen, stirring together two pans of chicken spaghetti, my eyes filled with tears. I’ve never known hunger that wasn’t fulfilled. I’ve never gone to bed hungry. I’ve never gone without on any level, really. My tears were those of gratitude and deep sadness. Why not me and why them?

There’s a song I think of regularly by Matthew West. The lyrics ask, “What if there’s a bigger picture? What if I’m missing out? What if there’s a greater purpose I could be living right now? Outside my own little world.”

This time of year, many of us will gather with our family and friends. We will break bread, eat excessively and pass out on the couch watching football, then wake up just in time for dessert. I’m not saying that’s wrong. Rather, I’m saying it’s a gift.

I will continue to deliver pans of chicken spaghetti, and I will pray for those small bellies every day in between. And as I join my family at my grandmother’s table this holiday season, I will say a prayer of thanksgiving that my simplest needs have been met.

There’s another quote in “Journey to the Heart” that strikes a chord with me. It holds the simple truth that “the power of gratitude never wanes. Say it when you feel and believe it. Say it when you don’t. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.”

Stephanie Jordan is a local journalist, marketer and blogger. Her blog can be found at www. stephanienetherton.blogspot.com, and she can be contacted at [email protected].

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