Each day I wake to the news of the worst economy in a generation. I hear about unemployment, foreclosures, cut backs, layoffs, small business failings, and there is panic that the world is ending.

In the mist of the worst news cycle in some time is the mighty hand of God interceding on people’s behalf to make things better.

A few weeks ago I flew to the country of El Salvador in Central America with a small work and witness team based out of Avon Park. The trip intended to change lives, changed my life for the better. I look around my own home and am blessed with nice furnishings, two cars, a job, and a healthy family, yet I gripe like most Americans about the loss of $21,000 in income this year, but how foolish I was to say anything.

Less than five hours from here are a people who live on less than $10 a day. They don’t have proper running water, electricity, and they have children who go hungry each night. I met a 10-year-old boy whose name is Fernando, who lives in a tiny shack with dirt floors at the edge of the town of Jucuapa. He has a smile that would melt your heart, who is eager to learn English so he can get an education and become a doctor.

Through the eyes of this boy I saw a nation of people wanting more from its government to provide adequate health care, better schools, and jobs that put real food on the table.

So too is the call from residents in this nation, a call for more from our government in services, yet a call for less government interference in their daily lives in form of less taxes.

This balance of power is being played out all over the world, and yet in a remote village in the mountains of El Salvador sits a boy who just wants an education.

In my journal on the last night of my week long trip I wrote, “My world view has been expanded. I walk away from this trip with the view that with little much is done. The schools have little in the way of supplies, yet they educate happy children. The missionaries have little in the way of accommodations to live, yet they are impacting thousands of lives.

The community of Lehigh Acres has little in resources to give, but it does have heart, determination, and love of community. With that mindset groups small in number but mighty in spirit are banding together to help those in need.

From the teenage kid who mows his neighbor’s lawn, to the church collecting food for community services, to the business owner passing out day old bread, and fresh fruit and vegetables to those in need.

The community is facing a mountain. But through God’s help and our own willingness to help those in need, we can and will turn things around. Yet at times we want to take on our mountains alone without God and friends. This leads us to narrow paths that if one misstep we lose our footing (home foreclosures, loss of jobs) and tumble down the side of the mountain broken and defeated.

While the climb is challenging we must step outside of our comfort zone, and walk in faith that with Christ we are never defeated. God never gives up on us. He is always there, in the good and bad times helping us achieve our victories and to reach the peak in which our destiny awaits.

In the book of Ephesians 4:20-21 Paul writes to the people of Ephesus (modern day Turkey) during turmoil within the city “Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than we ask.”

God has shown me that throughout the world and even in my own neighborhood there are people who need our help, people to feed, cloth, and educate with the gospel and with resources. God’s promise to us is that he will help guide us out of this rough patch of life that we are all in. Through him all things are possible.

While I traveled thousands of miles away and saw need firsthand, all we have to do is drive five miles around our community and you will see people who need help.

So how can you help? You can bring food to Lehigh Community Services, donate your time to help feed people at the Our Daily Bread soup kitchen, pick up trash in your neighborhood. You don’t have to have treasure to bless others – just give of your time and talent. Giving of your gifts to those in need will bring a vitality of life to your own home and to those who you touch.

As I prayed for El Salvadoran people so too do I pray for this community to not look inward but outward to other people’s needs. With an outward look we will be able to provide that small gesture that may just change a life for the better.