4. Buy a Week’s Worth of Meals

Hundreds of families across the country can’t afford even the most basic needs—especially food. A good exercise to teach your children about helping others is to buy groceries for a family. Call your local Salvation Army or food bank, and find out the food needs of a family in your area.

When our family embarked on this project, we asked for a family who had the same family makeup as ours (although this is not necessary)—a family with two girls, a mother, and a father. This helped our girls to better identify with the family and to consider how it might feel if we were in a predicament in which we had no food.

Once we had the list of needs, we purchased enough complete meal items for the family to eat for a week. Some ideas:

•  Oatmeal, cereal, eggs, pancake mix

•  Bread, lunch meat, peanut butter and jelly, macaroni and cheese, tortillas, beans, cheese

•  Fresh fruit and vegetables—bananas, apples, carrots, celery, lettuce, potatoes

•  Miscellaneous items—hot dogs, chicken nuggets, spaghetti sauce and noodles, meal kits, cake mixes, canned frosting, graham crackers, cheese sticks, granola bars, fruit cups

•  Milk, orange juice, and coffee.

Our girls also added a drawing for the daughters of the family, and our entire family delivered the items to the Salvation Army, who in turn delivered the food to the family. One of the highlights of this project is to include some fun and tasty items that, because of their budget, a needy family may not otherwise have a chance to enjoy.

Up for Discussion

A woman once told me that while she was grateful for the local food bank, the only food items donated were the kind that no one else would eat and that few people actually liked to eat. As one who desperately depended on the food bank, this presented a very difficult choice: eat the unpleasant food or continue to be hungry.

Why does it matter? Why is it important that we donate groceries that a needy family would enjoy? How might this change your perspective the next time you donate food items?

Read Matt. 25:40. Why do you think God tells us in His Word that when we do something for someone in need, we’re really doing it for Him?

The King will reply, “I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.”

—Matt. 25:40