Friday Series III: How Helping Others Helps Yourself

I firmly believe that every kindness you do is repaid to you at some point. Maybe not right away, and likely not from the person to whom you were specifically kind to, but it will come back. My husband and I try to go out of our way to help people. Doing this once saved us nearly 3000 dollars later.

We have a wonderful friend, James. James married three months after we did. He had also just graduated and was unemployed, and his lease was up. He could not afford an apartment on his own, and his bride to be could not afford to pay for one for him and continue with her lease as well, and moving in together before marriage was not an option to them. So we offered to let him stay with us free of charge until his wedding, if he did not mind being shoved in our tiny office. He jumped on the offer, and lived with us during our first three months of marriage.

It was mostly fun, though the lack of space, privacy, and having only one bathroom was not fun sometimes! He was unemployed most of that time as well, so I had somebody to bake bread with and talk to during the day! My husband worked until midnight, so even if he was sleeping, it was nice to know that James was in the house, and I was not alone. He was also very kind to us in helping out with rabbit-sitting for us, as my husband's father was terminally ill at this time and we tried to go home as often as possible. It was a good situation all around. We were cramped, and it was inconvenient, but we were helping a friend and I knew that God would return the favor to us someday when we were in need. "(Luke 6:38 NIV) Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you."

We were given our measure back, and then some! About a year later, my husband got the opportunity to do an internship in Los Angeles. It paid, which was nice, but LA is an extremely expensive place to live. He was given less than a week's notice to be out there, and the arranged housing that was offered to him would have cost about 1000 dollars a month. James, who now lived and worked in LA, insisted that my husband live with him and his wife, rent free, as we had done this for him last year. He had his own very nice bedroom, and was even fed! He got to enjoy a beautiful (really, stunningly beautiful) house that was only three blocks from the beach. (I had to stay in Colorado to keep my job.) My husband would buy groceries whenever he could for them, but they kept the house very stocked and would refuse all offers of pay. My husband got a much better deal than we gave James. It was one of the best and quickest repayments for kindness that we have seen to date, and completely reaffirmed our belief that kindness is repaid. Not always so quickly, and so obviously, but it will come back at a time when it is needed.