I NEED Chocolate!!!

"I need Chocolate!" I sighed as I fell down on the hotel bed after a day filled with shy smiles, eager hugs, and generous gifts from the children at the Compassion church partner. Our tour group of nearly forty Americans had conducted a Vacation Bible School type event at a church project with over one hundred sponsored children. We had ended the day, by serving them lunch before they left to go to school. In Bolivia, children attend school for only four hours a day either in the morning or afternoon. My husband's response to my declaration of need caught me off guard. "Need? After what we've been seeing, I don't think that you can say that you need chocolate." His words were kind, and I was in a place to listen. In reality, I do not need chocolate, nor many of the things that I have learned to depend on. After seeing families in their homes, and thinking of my home, or watching women walking along the road carrying heavy loads and thinking of my car, there are many things that I do not need. In some cases, those things like cars or washing machines are not bad, and I would be foolish to opt to walk or wash my clothes by hand instead. We are blessed by the wealth of our nation and benefit from it every day. In other ways, I have let the extreme plenty of our country invade my expectations. I have come to think that I need and deserve the things that are really just God's bountiful blessings in my life. It is so easy to take my great blessings for granted and to see them as my right. It is easy to begin to base my happiness and fulfillment in things rather than in my relationship with the Almighty God. I do not need chocolate, but I did enjoy the dark chocolate that my brother bought for me in Sucre, Bolivia where they are known for their chocolate making. After all, the native peoples of South America were the first to enjoy chocolate. I'm really glad that they shared!