Earlier this year, I was is in Atlanta with a group of CURE colleagues at the Passion conference. One evening, we shared a meal at a well-known Atlanta grill, and I was struck by the buttons that our waiters and waitresses were wearing. The buttons read:

“Eat Great. Do Good.”

The concept was that somehow through paying for a steak, you could “do good”, and to its credit, the restaurant has a reputation for being socially conscious. When the servers asked us what we do (as CURE), our table playfully responded, “We actually DO good.”

I’ve been thinking more about that “Do Good” message over the last several months, particularly the idea of taking something that is a part of our common lives and making it more meaningful, more teachable, and more purposeful. I realized that – in some ways – this concept is like God, who is the ultimate contextual communicator.

Making it more than a meal

You see, God Himself has done this same thing throughout Biblical history – taking the everyday parts of life and using them to help us connect to Him. In Old Testament Israel, the concept of offering a sacrifice to a “god” was not new or unique to Hebrew culture. Every society did it. Yet God took a well-known religious practice and ascribed new, transformational meaning to it. Rather than using an offering to feed Yahweh, who (unlike other “gods”) needed nothing from His people, He invited people to a party at His house (the Tabernacle) to celebrate the good things that He had done for them. They burned up a piece of the offering on the altar to honor God and then were invited by God to enjoy a BBQ in His presence with the rest of the meat. (Don’t believe me? leave a comment to discuss. I’ll be happy to respond).

And in His final weeks on earth, Jesus took the most common elements of first century living – bread and wine – and ascribed meaning to them, using a meal as an opportunity to remember His sacrifice and love for us in the practice of communion.

For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup [which is everyday], you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes – 1 Cor. 11:26

Doing Good this Mother’s Day

Well, we’re fast approaching Mother’s Day, and all of us are planning to do something to honor Mom. So CURE is asking you to ascribe even deeper meaning to your Mom’s gift this Mother’s Day. Instead of just buying your Mom a gift or a card, we’re asking you to make a donation to CURE in honor of your Mom.

Your donation will help a mom in a CURE hospital.

And in response…

And as a thank you, we’ll mail your mom one of four lovely greeting cards with a custom message that you provide. Depending on what donation you choose to give, we’ll also send via Priority Mail a gift to your mom from either Uganda or Afghanistan to help you and her remember the difference you made for another mom this Mother’s Day.

We think of it as a win-win-win.

Your mom gets a beautiful reminder of how much you appreciate her. You and she get an opportunity to make a life-saving impact for a mom in a CURE hospital. CURE gets the opportunity to partner with you and your mom in healing sick kids and sharing the good news of God’s love for them and their moms this Mother’s Day. Win-win-win.

So what are you waiting for? If you have a mom in your life who needs to be honored, we have moms in our hospitals whom you and she can help this Mother’s Day.

Making Mother’s Day a life-saving experience: it doesn’t get more meaningful than that.