I'd like a #1 Combo with a Cherry Limeade, Please...

It would be embarrassing for me to tell you how much fast-food our family consumes on a weekly basis. It's not that we don't like to cook -- it's actually one of my favorite things to do -- it's just that our schedule constantly leaves us with a need for something fast and easy. Thank goodness for the Sonic (and Cane's Chicken and Wendy's and Boston Market). At the end of the day, it's just easier to have someone else do the cooking, and all I have to do is eat and throw the "dishes" away.

Come to think of it, it would be embarrassing to list everything that I have someone else do for me. Seriously, clean the house, cut the grass, wash the cars... I guess in my list of priorities, those are things that I am happy to hand off to other people. And to me, those people are heroes, because they make life easier.

But the question is What do I do to make other people's lives easier? Am I so caught up in having things taken off my plate that I don't help make other people's platters a little lighter?

Our sermon on Sunday was about serving, and the Pastor reminded us that we should never consider ourselves "graduated" from the role of The Server to the role of The Served.

That just goes against the grain of life, though, doesn't it? Isn't part of the so-called American Dream to have an Oprah-kind-of life where someone walks our dogs, buys our groceries and drives us to-and-fro -- you know, a staff!

But there is another part of the American Dream called Relationships. Connections with other people. It's not even the American Dream, it's just who we are as people. And there is this part of a relationship that isn't unlocked until you have served someone, or been the recipient of someone serving you. When you care enough about someone -- or they you -- to do something that was probably inconvenient but made life easier.

We are very, very blessed to have friends who gladly put on their name tag of Server and ask how they can help us. Or they don't even ask -- they see a need and take the initiative to just do. And there is something about those friendships that is sweet and special, because they have gone past the point of just smiling and waving, and they have really settled down in our lives for the long haul -- long enough to see our needs, and settled enough that they want to be the ones to meet them.

So I'm challenged this week to Serve. To be the one to make your load a little lighter and your life a little easier. (And no tipping, please!)