by Kirk Walden, Advancement Specialist

Are you one of those who has a tendency to compare yourself to others? I can be. And my comparisons often show me coming up . . . short.

Others appear more engaging, more educated, more everything. They seem to have the very gifts I don’t possess.

The funny thing is, I may be exactly right. Not all of us are alike. God gives different gifts and talents to each of us and for His reasons only, some appear to have more than others.

The parable of the talents in Matthew 25 tells us of a master giving talents (a measure of money) to three servants. One received five talents, another two, and another, one. We know the story well.

The servant who received five talents made five more, and the servant who received just one talent hid his away and made nothing. The first servant was rewarded with greater authority. The third was cast aside for not using what he was given.

But what about the servant in the middle ... the one who received two talents? We see no record of him complaining about receiving just two talents, and there is nothing in the text about any grumbling over the difficulty in making more money with only two—while another was given five.

Instead, we see a servant who took no time to compare to another and instead went to work with what he had. In the end, he gained two more talents. Do you know what fascinates me about the master’s response? For both the servant who received two talents and the one who received five, the reward is the same.

Both servants are told, “Well done, good and faithful servant. You were faithful with a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.” (Mt. 25:21, 23)

I suspect many of us feel we are a little short of talents at times. And yet, the Lord is only asking us to take what we have and give our best. If we build on what we have, He receives joy--which He then invites us into.

So today, let’s all take heart. The joy of our master is not dependent on the number of talents we receive, but on how we use the ones we have.

3 Ways Option Line Works for You

As a Heartbeat International affiliate, your pregnancy help organization is automatically listed on Heartbeat's Option Line® (1-800-712-HELP), a 24-7 pregnancy helpline that answers over 1,100 calls, emails, text messages and live chats every day in English and Spanish, sending callers to local help organizations like yours. Our job is to help you care for her.

Here are a few of the ways we do that.

We share the financial load.

Every contact Heartbeat’s Option Line® makes costs about $4.25. We refer an average of 42 contacts a year to each of our more than 2,700 listed pregnancy help organizations. That’s a value of $178.50 per year for your organization alone!

We send her to your website.

On OptionLine.org, a client can search for a center near her. Each month in the past year, an average of over 200 searches on OptionLine.org have turned up your center. Our top-10 centers all averaged over 7,000 views in the last year, bringing women in desperate need of help face-to-face with your center’s information.

We cover the phones 24/7 in both English and Spanish.

Does your center struggle to cover the phones overnight? Option Line is your answer for overnight help. You can also forward your calls to Option Line when you can't cover a shift. Rather than hearing a recording, a woman will speak to a real human being, who will answer her initial questions and connect her to help right in her area—that is, you!

Bonus! When you take advantage—at no cost—of Option Line’s Appointment Scheduling, a consultant can schedule an appointment at your center right on the spot. Click here to learn more.

 As a Heartbeat affiliate, changes can be made to your Option Line listing in real-time so that women searching for you have up-to-date information about your organization at any hour of the day. 

Option Line lists pregnancy help organizations affiliated with either Heartbeat International or Care Net. If your organization prefers to not become a Heartbeat affiliate, that's okay! Care Net provides us with a list of their affiliates on a quarterly basis. We update our Option Line database based on that list. Please communicate any changes to your information with Care Net and the changes will be made with the next quarterly update.

by Mary E. Peterson, Heartbeat Housing Specialist

When we enter this world as an infant, we are completely receptive. We receive our being from God via our parents. We receive love, nourishment, and comfort at the hands of others. 

With wonder and awe, we slowly receive the whole of creation into our understanding—starting with our hands and feet and gradually extending outward to include all of our surroundings. 

I think of my young niece repeatedly and gleefully acclaiming with amazement in her voice, “It’s raining! It’s raining!“ She delights in the very existence of rain! It’s this receptive-state that Michael Naughton is pointing out when he says “As creatures, we are first receivers before we are givers.”[1]

As adult Christians, particularly as those involved in a  sacrificial kind of ministry, we think a lot about the holiness of and need for the giving part of love. Whether it’s attentive listening, providing for material needs, upholding a woman’s dignity, or providing a safe place to cry, we give deeply of ourselves to another, pouring ourselves out in love. 

Sacrificing. Emptying ourselves for the sake of another.

Because it is so evident that the giving part of love is beautifully holy, it is easy to fall into the error of thinking of the receiving part of love as selfish or as a mere strategy that allows us to keep giving.

What a subtle and dangerous error! Scripture teaches us otherwise. Consider Mary’s fiat “be it done onto me according to your Word” and Jesus’ invitation to become like children. Utter receptivity is holy!

As you think through your ministry, be sure to remember that loving includes both giving AND receiving. Just as you are called to give of your whole being, you are invited to receive with your whole being. 

From the God of all creation as well as the people in your life, receive deeply!