Episode
Kindness in the Face of Need
- Podcast
- Grace for All
- Published
- May 21, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 322
- Processing state
not_requested- Canonical source
- https://graceforall.captivate.fm/episode/repeat
Actions
POST https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/grace-for-all-6595211/episodes/kindness-in-the-face-of-need/transcription-requests
Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode.GET https://stenobird.com/podcast/grace-for-all-6595211/kindness-in-the-face-of-need.md
Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource.
Summary
1 Corinthians 10:24 No one should seek their own good, but the good of others. Proverbs 19:17 Whoever is generous to the poor lends to the Lord, and he will repay him for his deed. Several years ago, I was heading up a USAID project in Southern Africa and I found myself in Mozambique at an agricultural experiment station. The grant I had contained little room for unplanned expenses. But with that grant, we trained more than 15,000 farmers in Lesotho, Mozambique, and Zimbabwe and greatly improved corn yields for those farmers. But on this day, I needed to go to another location. I found a minibus going that way, and I paid the equivalent of about $5, and got in. Occupancy should have been twelve, but I counted more than 20 people. It took us 5 hours to go about 130 miles. I got the seat on the hump next to the driver and had to put my arm around him so I could breathe. The bus was hot, everyone was sweaty, and the smell of the disinfectant used to clean wounds was thick. Many on the bus had bandages on extremities and eyes. But everyone had a smile. The driver said that just about all the passengers were going to a hospital for surgery or follow-ups, Many made the trip weekly. The road was awful. The potholes were huge and could be more than 4 feet deep. We hit one and had to sit on the edge of the pothole and to wait for the water to evaporate so the engine would start. The temperature climbed past 100.. I was hungry. My breakfast had been gone for hours. In my backpack I had two packets of cookies.. I got a package out, opened it, and then handed them back to the seat behind me. I did the same with the other package. I had just given away all of my food and had kept nothing for me. Soon there was a tap on my shoulder and a small bag of potato chips to share, some salt…