The least I can do

Tonight I went and did a service project with my Mothers of Preschoolers (MOPS) group. We made beautiful handmade cards for the children of Ft. Hood to send to their parent who is deployed overseas. We are putting together 120 packets of cards. Each packet has 8 cards plus a postcard for the deployed parent to send back to their child. We are supplying the cards, envelopes and stamps for the children. There is an amazingly talented woman in our group who designed all the cards and has organized the whole thing. We spent last Friday night cutting paper strips, squares and flowers (oh so many flowers) for the cards. The Mother's Day card alone has 12 little card stock flowers. Each of the flowers was die cut by us for all 120 packets. As you can imagine this project has been quite the undertaking. We were unable to finish tonight, so we will meet one more time to get it all done in a couple weeks.

As a whole the women in MOPS are caring, considerate, kind people. I have not met one who does not meet that description. Here is what confuses me: very few came to participate in the service project last week or tonight. We all have kids, husbands, etc. to consider and balance in our lives. We all have other things we could be doing instead of making little homemade cards for people we don't know. However, isn't the point of a service project to give up the time to help others? Is it service if the only other thing we would be doing is nothing? I was dismayed that only about 20% of our group showed up to participate on either night. How are we going to teach our kids to help others if we can't give up one Friday night?

I am not trying to sound critical, I just feel frustrated by the general apathy I see in people sometimes. We don't think about the sacrifices other people make to allow us to live free. We feel entitled to our comfortable lives. I am no better. I often turn the channel if the news gets to "real" for me. I have righteous anger towards those who abuse children, yet I have done nothing about it. In some ways it is all very overwhelming. The world is full of problems, I am just one person. One person who does not even handle her own problems well, I certainly can't be trusted to help anyone else. Then I read about people like Greg Mortenson who builds houses in Pakistan and Afghanistan. I look at my friends and family in the military and realize these people are missing seeing their children grow up so I can sleep well at night. These are the people I find inspiring. They make me want to do good for others. Thus, when the opportunity was placed in front of me, I had to go help. It is truly the least I can do for the children and the parents who miss them.

I hope to pass this desire to serve down to my children. I hope they find value in helping those we don't know or see daily. I hope they understand that sometimes Mommy has to go help others. We have different activities we do to help them see how it can be fun to serve too. How are you passing this important concept on to your children? Do you think it is worthwhile? What do you think?