Disciples in Mission
Minute Message

The day after Thanksgiving the New York Times told of a 33-year old local cab driver whose shoulder-length hair was tied in a ponytail. (Don’t get distracted by the ponytail!) About five years ago, this cabby “prayed to God for guidance on how to help the forgotten people of the streets who exist in life’s shadows.” As he recalls it, God replied: “Make eight pounds of spaghetti, throw it in a pot, give it out on 103rd St. and Broadway with no conditions, and people will come.” He did, they came, and now he goes from door to door giving people food to eat.

I am not asking you to stuff the Big Apple with spaghetti. But a New York cabby can bring light into your Advent night. He prayed to a God who was there; he listened; he gave the simple gift God asked of him; he gave “with no conditions;" and people responded. Here is your Advent: Make the Christ who has come a reality, a living light, in your life and in some other life. Give of yourself.. .to one dark soul.. .with no conditions.

by Walter J. Burghardt, from Sir, We Would Like to See Jesus, reprinted in An Advent Sourcebook