African Proverb

A funny thing happened on the beach yesterday. Our sons Luke, Isaac and David were building a sandcastle. All was going well and it was nearing completion when a woman with an old labrador dog decided to settle down nearby. Whilst she was attending to her children the dog, who was on a long lead, lolloped up to the near-completed sandcastle, had a good look at it, cocked his leg and proceeded to wee all over one side of it! The dog-owner was extremely embarrassed. Our boys – and Sam and I – thought it very amusing!

I know quite a number of people who I’d describe as kind. One of the kindest is Sam – my wife. That’s one reason I find her so attractive. She has a lovely, caring practical heart. I saw evidence of this later when we decided to buy coffee from the kiosk on the beach front. Sam had noticed that the woman with the dog, probably in her 30’s, had two young children with her and was heavily pregnant. Realising that she couldn’t leave them unattended Sam approached her and offered to buy her coffee too. In the end, the woman said ‘no’ as she was about to leave, but she was really touched that on a beach full of strangers someone should offer such a simple act of kindness.

Something similar happened last week. We were out with friends and the sun was shining so we bought two boxes of cornetto ice-creams from the supermarket. When they were all handed out there was one left, so Sam went up to a post-man who was finishing his rounds and gave it to him. I heard him say, ‘Thank you very much. That’s never happened to me before’. It made his day!

So there we have two acts of kindness. Simple. Uncomplicated. Not difficult.

In my daily blog yesterday I wrote about riding waves through ‘practising’. And I specifically mentioned practising kindness. Even on my holidays I want, like my wife, to practise kindness today (Eph 4:32). Can you do that?

Ask the Lord to help you do something simple and kind today in Jesus’ name.