Sometimes it’s the little things that bug me. I order a cup of coffee and the cashier wants to sell me the next size up: “It’s only an extra twenty-five cents!”

No thanks.

It’s like this everywhere. “Can I super-size that for you? Can I talk to you about our extended warranty? Have you heard about our exclusive-customer-rewards-membership-club?”

Thank you, no.

My credit card company wants to sell me life insurance, my life insurance company wants to sell me a coffee maker, and the coffee shop wants to sell me CD’s.

These people aren’t being considerate. They don’t care about my well-being. They don’t really see me. I’m a margin on their spread-sheet; a sales-lead; a customer contact; or a “valuable community partner.” They’ve been meticulously taught to talk every penny of profit from my reluctant pockets.

In a world like this it threatens the natural order of things when you give stuff away. It confounds people when you’re kind to them for the sake of being kind. It shakes the ground beneath their feet.

Recently, six of us gave away light bulbs door-to-door. People need light bulbs. A bulb in your house blinks out, you check your cupboards and sure enough you have no bulbs. It’s a pain. Now you have to go to the local mega-mart just to buy a light bulb, and, of course, while you’re there they try to sell you something else. Sheesh.

So we give away light bulbs. It’s the little things. People usually don’t know what to think and get all weird about it, which always makes it a lot of fun.

One woman in particular comes to mind. As she answered the door I smiled and explained, "We're giving away light bulbs as a small way to show people the love of God. Can I give you a pack?"

“What?” said the unkempt older woman sharply. I repeated myself. She stood there for a moment, wrestling with disbelief and finally demanded, "Okay, what's the deal here?" Gently shaking my head I said, "no deal, just free light bulbs. Can I give you some?" 

Against her better judgment she opened the screen door and took the bulbs along with a card that said “God loves you - no strings attached.” She read it and said, "I don't really go to church." She wasn't apologizing. "No problem, I said, just let us know if we can do anything else to help."

She melted. You could actually see it. She believed we weren’t there for any reason other than kindness. For a moment I really thought she would cry, but then she remembered herself and checked her hair the way old women do when they suddenly care about the company they're keeping.

She said thank you and she meant it. We said goodbye and as we walked away I was struck by the simple power of genuine human contact. It doesn’t take much to remind people that they’re worth more than the sum of their wallets. All it takes is a few simple little things.

Simple Lessons

There are a few simple lesson’s I’ve learned from doing things like this:

1. Whatever you do, do something:
Have you noticed how easy it is to slip into protective isolation? We tend to drift toward perceiving the world as a frightening place full of “evil” influences. So we insulate ourselves. Mostly, we just learn to ignore people. The people at the gas station or the video store or the local mega-mart. One of the powerful things about generosity is its ability to break us out of our guarded funk. This is also why it can be so fun, because we learn the joy of surprise and kindness, and we learn that when you live from the place of expressing God's love the world literally becomes a safer place. When you discover you’re beginning to withdraw, go serve people in some small way. Do something.

2. Whatever you do, think small:
We have a tendency to believe that bigger is better. Remember when the Big Gulp at Seven-Eleven seemed huge? Now it’s the runt of the soft-drink litter. There’s a word for the mechanism that sells us this lie: it's called “hype.” We’re terribly vulnerable to hype, and the best cure is learning to think small. You may think you can't make a difference in people's lives because you aren't the kind of leader who speaks to large crowds, but how many times will you talk to the checker at the grocery store, or wait in line with people, or have a chance to talk to your neighbors? It's all the little moments in life that add up to an amazing opportunity to profoundly reach people with kindness, generosity, and love. These kinds of little things will change the world.

3. Whatever you do, do it for nothing:
Not taking money for handing out light bulbs is the easy part. My question is, what do we tend to expect in return for the little things we do? The apostle Paul said, “Love must be sincere” (Romans 12:9), which I think means doing what is right and good without expecting someone to pay you back.

Next time you’re doing something nice for someone, ask yourself, “If I absolutely knew that this person would never do anything for me in return, would I still help them today?” Be honest. If the answer is “probably not”, then you’re not really expressing sincere love. Love is not just another means to an end, it is the greatest end of all our means. Always remember, true love has no price tag.

Love is the right thing to do whether it pays us back or not, because if enough of us learn to love in this way, then we'll all reap the greatest possible reward.