08/24/2026
I just finished this chapter for my book. I didn’t want to wait until I publish to share it with you guys. I really do appreciate everyone that is making this become a reality. We are just getting started.
Building Chains
Today I was delivering meals for a food ministry I’m involved in, and somewhere along the route, something hit me differently. We talk a lot about breaking chains. And we should. There are some chains that absolutely need to be broken. Chains of abuse, addiction, alcoholism, neglect, bitterness, poverty. Chains of hurt that get passed from one generation to the next until somebody finally stands up and says,
This stops with me.
We celebrate the person who breaks that chain. The one who says, “My children will not grow up the way I did.” The one who puts down the bottle, walks away from the drugs, finally asks for help, refuses to become the person who hurt them. Those are powerful stories. And they should be. Some chains need to hit the ground and never be picked back up.
But today I realized something. Sometimes God calls us to build chains too. Not chains that bind people or chains that hold people down. Chains that hold people together.
Several months ago, I went to my pastor with an idea. I told him I wanted to start a food ministry through our church. It wasn’t something I had thought of that morning. Feeding people has been on my heart for a long time. There is something about food ministry that has always felt deeply biblical to me.
Maybe because food is so basic. Everybody understands hunger. You can debate theology and argue doctrine. You can disagree about a hundred different things. But hunger is pretty simple. If somebody is hungry, you feed them.
Jesus did. He cared about people’s souls, but He also noticed when their stomachs were empty. He preached to crowds, healed the sick, taught about the kingdom of God. But He also looked at hungry people and said, in essence, “We need to feed them.” That has always meant something to me.
So, I went to my pastor and told him what I wanted to do. He was a little hesitant. And I understood why. Pastors hear ideas all the time. Someone gets excited about something. They feel called. They have a vision. They make plans. Everybody gets behind it.
Then a few weeks or months go by. The excitement wears off. Life gets busy. The work gets harder than expected. The passion starts to fade. And suddenly the ministry somebody wanted to start becomes somebody else’s responsibility, or worse, it just disappears.
My pastor had seen that happen before. But he also knew my heart for feeding people. He knew this wasn’t something I had dreamed up because I was bored and needed a project. So, he agreed.
I told him I wanted the ministry to stand on its own as much as possible. I didn’t want the church to have to carry the financial burden of it. We would trust God. We would let people know what we needed. We would ask people to help. And we would see what happened.
We started small. Food boxes. That was the plan. Collect food. Pack it into boxes. Give it to families in our community who needed a little help. Nothing flashy. Nothing complicated. Just groceries.
A box of food might not seem like much. A few cans, some beans, rice, pasta, peanut butter, maybe cereal. Things most of us walk past in the grocery store without thinking much about.
But when the cupboards are empty, ordinary food stops being ordinary. It becomes supper. It becomes breakfast. It becomes one less thing to worry about. It becomes breathing room. So, we started collecting.
And then something happened.
People started giving. Then more people started giving. Somebody would bring canned goods. Someone else would hand us money. Another person would ask, “What do you need?” Somebody would show up with bags of food. Someone else would volunteer to organize it. Then people started helping pack boxes.
Before long, it wasn’t my idea anymore. It belonged to all of us. One person became two. Two became five. Five became ten.
And I started realizing something. God had taken one burden placed on one heart and started attaching other hearts to it. One link at a time.
Then I got a call. Another food ministry in our area was going to close. They had been delivering hot meals directly to people’s homes, and we were asked if we would consider taking over that part of the ministry.
That was different. Food boxes were one thing. Hot meals were another. A food box could be packed ahead of time. Hot meals meant schedules, menus, groceries, cooking, ovens, pots, pans, volunteers, containers, delivery routes, cars, gas, timing. It meant getting food cooked, packed, and delivered while it was still hot enough to feel like a meal instead of leftovers.
It would have been easy to say, “That’s more than we signed up for.” And truthfully, it was. But sometimes God opens a door that is bigger than the room you thought you were building.
So, we talked about it. We prayed about it. And we decided to walk through the door.
Today was our first day delivering those meals. I wish I could fully explain what it felt like to watch everything come together. People showed up to cook. Nobody was getting paid. Nobody was punching a clock. Nobody was being forced to be there.
They simply came. They chopped. They stirred. They baked. They cleaned. They laughed. They worked.
Then more people came to help prepare the boxes. Meals were portioned out. Containers were closed. Everything was organized. Delivery routes were divided. Cars were loaded. Names were checked. Addresses were checked. And then we went out. House by house. Person by person. Meal by meal.
Some of the people we deliver to have lived hard lives. You can see it sometimes. You can hear it in the way they talk. Life has left marks. There has been abuse, addiction, mental health struggles, loss, loneliness, broken families, broken bodies, broken dreams. Things that most of us will never fully understand.
Yes, they needed the food. But somewhere along those delivery routes, it became very clear to me that the meal was not the biggest thing we were giving them. What many of them really needed was to be seen. They needed somebody to pull into their driveway, to walk up to their door, to knock, to look them in the eye, say their name, to ask, “How are you doing?” And then actually wait for the answer. They needed a reminder that they had not been forgotten.
That little box of food was saying something far bigger than whatever was printed on the label. It was saying, We see you. You matter. Somebody thought about you today.
I think sometimes we underestimate the ministry of simply showing up. We think ministry has to happen behind a pulpit. We think it requires a microphone. A Bible study. A sermon. A stage.
But sometimes ministry looks like carrying a meal up somebody’s front steps. Sometimes it looks like standing in a doorway while someone tells you about their week. Sometimes it looks like listening to the same story twice because that person has not had anybody else to tell it to. Sometimes it looks like saying, “Can I pray with you before I leave?” Sometimes it is nothing more complicated than being present.
Something else happened that day. The people making the deliveries changed too. They saw things they had not seen before. It is one thing to hear that there are people in need. It is another thing to stand on their porch. It is one thing to say, “We ought to help people.” It is another thing to look into the eyes of someone who desperately needs to know that somebody cares.
Need looks different when it has a face. Loneliness looks different when it has a name. Poverty looks different when you are standing in the driveway. And compassion looks different when it stops being an idea and becomes a person standing in front of you.
The people delivering those meals came back different. You could hear it in the conversations. Their hearts had moved. They wanted to do more. Not because somebody gave them a speech. Not because anybody tried to guilt them into serving. They had simply seen the need for themselves.
And standing there thinking about everything that had happened, I realized we weren’t breaking a chain. We were building one.
It started with a burden in my heart. Then my pastor was willing to take a chance on that burden. Then somebody donated food, someone gave money, someone packed a box, someone came to cook, someone washed dishes, someone loaded meals into a car, someone drove down a road they had never been on before, someone knocked on a door, someone listened to a story, someone prayed with a person who needed prayer. And link by link the chain kept growing. Paul wrote,
“From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.”
Ephesians 4:16
I think that is what I saw that day. Each part doing its work. Nobody did everything. Nobody had to. Everybody just did their part. Everybody became a link. And when those links connected, something happened that none of us could have done alone.
That is the beautiful thing about a chain. One link by itself is not very impressive. You can hold it in your hand. It cannot reach very far. It cannot carry very much.
But connect enough links together and suddenly you have something strong. Something that can reach farther than any one person ever could. Something that can carry weight. Something that can pull. Something that can rescue. Something that can connect one person to another.
That is what ministry is supposed to look like. Not one person doing everything. Not one person getting all the credit. Not one person becoming the face of it all. Just a whole bunch of ordinary people connected by one purpose. Loving God. Loving people. And doing whatever part God puts in front of them.
I started wondering where this chain could go. Maybe somebody who receives a meal today will someday be in a position to help pack meals for somebody else.
Maybe one of the volunteers will go home and tell a friend what they saw. And next time that friend will come help.
Maybe a child will grow up watching their parents serve and learn that helping people is not some unusual event Christians do once a year. It is simply what Christians do.
Maybe somebody who has spent years believing nobody cares about them will begin to believe that maybe God has not forgotten them after all.
Maybe someone sitting alone in a quiet house will hear a knock at the door and discover that there are still people in this world who notice.
Maybe the person delivering the meal is carrying burdens of their own, and serving somebody else will remind them that God still has a purpose for their life.
Maybe someone who donates ten dollars will never meet the person who eats the meal that money helped buy. But those two people are connected anyway.
Galatians 6:2 says,
“Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.”
I have thought about that verse many times. But the word carry stood out to me differently. You cannot carry someone’s burden from a distance. At some point, you have to get close enough to pick up part of the weight.
That weight may look like groceries, a hot meal, sitting at a kitchen table and listening, prayer, helping with a bill, giving somebody a ride. Sometimes it is simply showing up.
We may make ministry more complicated than it needs to be. Jesus said,
“For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in.”
Matthew 25:35
He did not say everybody had to preach, to lead a ministry, to have a title. He did not say everybody had to solve every problem. He simply pointed to ordinary acts of compassion and said,
You fed Me.
You gave Me something to drink.
You welcomed Me.
You showed up.
That is powerful to me. Because most of us are never going to solve poverty. We are not going to fix every broken family. We cannot cure every addiction. We cannot erase every painful childhood. We cannot undo decades of hurt. And sometimes the size of the need can make us feel like there is no point in doing anything.
What difference does one meal make?
What difference does one food box make?
What difference does one visit make?
Maybe more than we realize. No, a plate of food cannot erase years of abuse or cure addiction. It cannot heal mental health struggles or repair a broken relationship. But maybe that meal can become a link. A link between somebody who is hurting and somebody who cares. A link between loneliness and community. A link between hopelessness and hope. A link between somebody who feels forgotten and a group of people saying, “We have not forgotten you.”
And maybe, eventually, that link connects them to something even greater. To a church. To a community. To people who will walk beside them. To a Savior who has loved them all along.
There is another side to this too. We often talk about generational chains in a negative way. Generational addiction. Generational abuse. Generational poverty. Generational anger.
But what if good things can travel through generations too? What if compassion becomes a chain?
What if generosity becomes a chain?
What if service becomes a chain?
What if faithfulness becomes a chain?
What if a child grows up watching Mom and Dad load meals into the car and decides that helping people is normal? Then that child grows up and teaches their children the same thing.
One generation serves. Then another. Then another. Suddenly we are not just breaking bad chains. We are building good ones. Chains of faithfulness, kindness and compassion. Chains that stretch farther than we will ever live long enough to see.
Maybe some of the most important things we do for God will continue after we are gone because somebody watched us do them and decided, that is worth continuing.
That thought humbles me. Because I started this ministry thinking about food. God was thinking about people. I was thinking about boxes. God was thinking about connections. I was thinking about meals. God was thinking about chains. And the truth is, I do not know where the chain ends. Maybe I am not supposed to. Maybe my responsibility is simply to be faithful with the link God has placed in my hand.
That may be all any of us are asked to do. You may not be called to start a ministry. You may never organize a food drive. You may never cook fifty meals. But there is probably somebody close to you who needs a link. Someone who needs encouragement. Someone who needs prayer. Someone who needs a meal. Someone who needs a phone call. Someone who needs to know that they have not been forgotten. And maybe God is asking you to be that link. Not the whole chain. Just one link.
That is enough. Because the person before you did their part. You do yours. The person after you does theirs. And God connects the whole thing together.
So yes, I still believe in breaking chains. Some chains need to be broken. Some chains need to fall to the ground and stay there. But after today, I believe just as strongly in building them.
Chains of compassion, generosity, service, prayer. Chains of people willing to show up when somebody needs them. Strong chains. Good chains. Chains that do not hold people down. Chains that hold people together. And maybe that is what God has been doing from the beginning of this ministry.
I thought I was starting a food ministry. God was building a chain. One heart. One yes. One donation. One volunteer. One meal. One doorstep. One person at a time. And by the grace of God, I hope we never find the end of it.
