A strange thing happened to me the other day at the grocery store. My wife and I were going about our weekly shopping. We were a bit earlier than usual, about 9 in the morning, going through our list and loading our cart.
We were about halfway through when a group of four individuals came up to us and asked if we were going to be checking out soon. It seemed like an odd question (Did they want our cart?) but I told them we would be about 15 more minutes. One of the people said, “okay” and they walked away. Strange, I thought, but oh well, and we just continued shopping.
About a minute later one of the four came back to me and said, “I guess you might be wondering why we were asking about when you would be checking out.” I admitted that I was a bit curious. She went on to explain that they wanted to meet us at the register and pay for $50 of our grocery bill.
Now, this really caught me off guard, and I started to protest that surely there were others who needed it more than we did. But she insisted, and said, “If you don’t think you need it, then please just pay it forward.” I replied, “okay,” thinking if they really were at the register when we checked out and did pay $50 of our grocery bill, we could just pass it on to one of the local food banks, if nothing else. I didn’t think much more about it.
We finished gathering all our groceries and headed to the register. Sure enough, there was the group of four waiting for us. They greeted us at the register, waited until we had fully checked out, then handed the cashier a $50 bill. The cashier applied that to our purchase, and then we paid the balance.
We thanked the group, still kind of in a fog about the whole thing. Then one of them handed me a card and further explained that they were representing a local insurance agency and were on this campaign to spread kindness one random act at a time. They called it “Kindness is Contagious.”
And then we parted ways.
I never got any of their names, and they never asked for ours. It really was totally random and anonymous. As far as we know, they left the store the same time we did, so I don’t know if they went somewhere else to repeat the process, or if we just happened to be the recipient for that day. It was all rather serendipitous and, I might even say, bizarre. Why did we happen to be the people who were there at that particular time to get brought into this process of kindness sharing?
I have no idea whether these four people, or the agency they represented, have any particular expectation of what might be precipitated by this random act of kindness. And I suppose that’s the point:. Sometimes we should just do things that are totally random acts of kindness, and not overthink about how it might all play out. These people knew nothing about our financial circumstances, our politics, our religious beliefs, where we lived or how we might act upon their act of kindness. I’m sure they did not know that I write an occasional column for the Monitor and that this story might reach a lot more people than they would ever expect.
In some ways this was like the ultimate act of faith, doing something completely random and having faith that what you are doing will spread a little bit of kindness in the world, no matter who the recipient is. How often do we struggle with who is “deserving” of our charity, wanting to make sure that we really help those who are in need. Yet here, any preconceptions about the recipients are totally skipped over, and the act of kindness is just done, no justification, no questioning, no validation of need. How much easier is that than trying to evaluate recipients of our charity so we make sure to “get it right,” instead just trusting and having faith that somewhere down the road, this one random act will find its way to someone who needs it most?
I expect to be processing this for quite some time yet. For now, I do plan to send a check to a local food bank for $50 — I think of that as a sort of multiplier effect of the original kind act. But beyond that? Suppose I were to take a $50 bill, place it in an envelope with a note about random acts of kindness and paying it forward, and then go somewhere and just hand it to a total stranger and walk away. What might such an act precipitate going forward? A $50 gift to someone in need, or the impetus for self-reflection such as has happened for me? Who knows?
That is the beautiful and powerful mystery of faith.
Reynolds, a Jefferson City resident, is an ordained Episcopalian deacon.
