Holiday Miracles

"Never underestimate the power of a small group of committed people to change the world. In fact, it is the only thing that ever has." - Margaret Mead

December is a month of miracles, a time to remember the important things in life, a time to be aware of our blessings and a time to share our good fortune.

I want to tell you about a miracle I recently witnessed.

Our family decided this year to adopt a family through the Phoenix Rescue Mission. Without organizations like the rescue mission, Salvation Army, churches and so many others, the children in these families would most likely awake on Christmas morning to scarcely anything to eat and certainly no gifts under the tree. The decision to participate was an easy one for us. When I spoke with the coordinator at the rescue mission on Thursday, they had over 40 families who still needed to be adopted with a deadline to receive all donated gifts and food by Saturday. Wow- less than 48 hours to find more than 40 people willing to adopt a family and pull it off in just over a day?! This means shopping for gifts for the children and creating a food box for the family. Then the gifts have to be wrapped and labeled and everything delivered to the rescue mission. Sounds almost impossible, but for several of us, this was simply a call to rise to the challenge. So, all day Thursday and Friday we twittered and posted updates on Twitter and Facebook, urging locals to help out if they could. It was amazing to watch people I do not know personally retweet my updates on twitter and vice versa. There was an invisible bond there between us all created by a shared agenda.

On Saturday we loaded our family up to deliver gifts and food to the mission. When I arrived I spoke with the coordinator who, with an almost squealing voice, says “not only did we get all 40+ families adopted, we have a waiting list of people ready to adopt families, so we are able to open it up to more neighborhoods in Phoenix. This has never happened before, we have never had a waiting list of people wanting to help!!”

To see people come together with a united cause, in an effort to help those less fortunate and to do so with such uncommon results, well, that is amazing and gives me goose bumps and tears in my eyes. Knowing those children will awake on Christmas day with food to eat and gifts to open, well this my friends is a miracle and this is what the holidays is all about.