the encounter

While, thinking about the Gospel of Enough and the Gospel of Generosity lately… this writing from the second century always gets me:

It is the Christians, O Emperor, who have sought and found the truth, for they acknowledge God.
They do not keep for themselves the goods entrusted to them.
They do not covet what belongs to others.
They show love to their neighbors.
They do not do to another what they would not wish to have done to themselves.
They speak gently to those who oppress them, and in this way they make them friends.
It has become their passion to do good to their enemies.
They live in the awareness of their smallness.
Every one of them who has anything gives ungrudgingly to the one who has nothing.
If they see a traveling stranger, they bring him under their roof.
They rejoice over him as over a real brother, for they do not call one another brothers after the flesh, but they know they are brothers in the Spirit and in God.
If they hear that one of them is imprisoned or oppressed for the sake of Christ, they take care of his needs. If possible they set him free.
If anyone among them is poor or comes into want while they themselves have nothing to spare, they fast two or three days for him.
In this way they can supply any poor man with the food he needs.
This, O Emperor is the rule of life of the Christians, this is their manner of life.
– Asistides 137 AD

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I think its safe to say that we’d all like to be able to help a friend in need. It’s probably even safe to say that many of us would be willing to help a stranger if it didn’t take too much out of our own wallet or time or energy.

I personally wish I was less selfish myself and more giving — even when it stretches my wallet or time.

But perhaps we can all re-think a corporation’s generosity (aka marketing) to help those who are hurting and in need.

This week @sgalloway re-tweeted an idea that while many were jumping on Oprah’s FREE KFC coupon offer for themselves — perhaps the better idea would be to print out the coupons and give some free food to the homeless or others in need. (unfortunately you can no longer print off the coupons – but if you’ve printed the coupons off – they’re still good for a week or so.)

I had ignored the e-mails I had seen up until that point, but after seeing the idea, I quickly jumped on it and printed out my 4 coupons to buy a meal for someone else.

Today I saw another freebie from Sonic :: FREE CroisSONIC™ Breakfast Sandwich with purchase of a large drink.

I’m not sure what the normal price of this CroisSonic is but I’d bet you’re saving $3-$4 with the coupon.

So you buy a drink for yourself and get a FREE breakfast sandwich to give to someone in need. Or better yet, spend a buck or two and get a sandwich and a drink for someone else in need.

I bet there are promotions like this popping up all over the place. Perhaps we can re-think these promotions and rather than scoring a great deal for ourselves – we can better help someone else in need.

What promotions have you seen recently? Anyone else put this into practice?

Photo from strandloper

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