Each of us is driven to satisfy our needs. But what happens when someone else has a need and we have to ignore it to get our own needs met? In families and in society at large there is perceived competition for need satisfaction. There is also another level to this competition – satisfaction of desires. We NEED air, water and food; we DESIRE status, luxuries and pleasures. These desires drive us as passionately as needs do. Wars are fought over them. When God designed us and put us into our environment, was it His intention that we fight over things? Are supplies actually so scarce that not everyone’s needs are going to be met? Or, is there actually enough to go around if only we would share what we have?
A poor widow in the Bible learned the answer to this question in First Kings 17:7-16 from the prophet Elijah after God spoke to him: “Go at once to Zarephath in the region of Sidon and stay there. I have directed a widow there to supply you with food.” So he went to Zarephath. When he came to the town gate, a widow was there gathering sticks. He called to her and asked, “Would you bring me a little water in a jar so I may have a drink?” As she was going to get it, he called, “And bring me, please, a piece of bread.” “As surely as the Lord your God lives,” she replied, “I don’t have any bread—only a handful of flour in a jar and a little olive oil in a jug. I am gathering a few sticks to take home and make a meal for myself and my son, that we may eat it—and die.” Elijah said to her, “Don’t be afraid. Go home and do as you have said. But first make a small loaf of bread for me from what you have and bring it to me, and then make something for yourself and your son. For this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: ‘The jar of flour will not be used up and the jug of oil will not run dry until the day the Lord sends rain on the land.’” She went away and did as Elijah had told her. So there was food every day for Elijah and for the woman and her family. For the jar of flour was not used up and the jug of oil did not run dry, in keeping with the word of the Lord spoken by Elijah.” By sharing even the little we have, God makes a way for us and the others we are helping. But we have to do it to prove God’s Word true for us.
Remember the little boy with five loaves and two fish that fed 5,000? Have faith in God. The more the Knights of Columbus give, the more we get to give more. His Word to Elijah is equally true for us and you.
For information on joining the Knights of Columbus / St. Bonaventure Council No. 12240, contact
Grand Knight Jude Hodges (954) 235-4524 [email protected].
or
Membership Director Joe Cox (954) 614-3209 [email protected]
St. Bonaventure Knights of Columbus Council 12240 
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