(Note: After writing this blog, I finally sat down to watch FROZEN 2 with my eight-year-old daughter Serena. I had NO IDEA, that “doing the next right thing” was part of that story, nevermind a song. While we don’t take our guidance or theology from Disney, we can encourage one another to “do the next right thing”, one day at a time. These are words for our time.)

Stay calm, and do the next right thing. Last week I told you about my friend in Bergamo, Italy who took in her friend who was panicked, sick and had children to care for. From her quarantine, she shared with us that staying calm is essential in these days of uncertainty. 

In her most recent letter two days ago, she shared that her friend is now in the hospital with heart troubles, on top of Covid-19. She is breathing easier and her fever is down. My friend is well and looking after her friend’s two children, 10 and four-years-old. We continue to be grateful.

At our team meeting this morning, our entrepreneurial coach Bron Vasic said something that echoes the words of my missionary friend in Italy.

“Stay calm and do the next right thing,” he encouraged us. 

For my friend in Italy, the next right thing was taking in her sick friend, and now her friend’s children. Some of us may not be asked to go to these lengths in this season, but there are things that need to be done every day; taxes need filing, EI benefits need to be applied for, your mortgage lending institution may need to be called, groceries bought, games played, children reassured. 

Doing the next right thing may mean:

• practising patience with those you are speaking with, 
• being patient as you dial, and re-dial, and then wait to talk to someone at Canada Revenue Agency,
• keeping your thoughts and words to yourself, instead of saying something you will regret later,
• making a phone call, or saying a prayer, or making food for someone on your mind,
• saying thank you to all those people who cannot stay home because they are providing our food, our health care, and enforcing our safety.

You get the idea. You can write your own list and put it on the fridge.

Doing the next right thing is being patient and kind. Not rocket science. But as the stress is finding its way into our lives, we need to guard our hearts and minds like an armoured man. If you find it hard to be kind and patient, breathe deeply, take a walk, pray, call a friend and tell them how you feel. BUT don’t stay in your anxiety and anger. It doesn’t do you any good. We need to stay calm, and do the next right thing – for our own sakes, for the sake of our families, and the community at large.

Please reach out to your pastors, your family, or your praying friends if you need help navigating these times. You can call our More Than Enough office at 613-520-4157 for prayer, especially as you navigate “doing the next right thing” with your finances. We are in this together.