Every Monday, Andy gives me what I call “Amy Day”. He teaches school, drives the girls to ballet, and makes spaghetti while I read, write, and eat plenty of Mexican food. Amy Day, not surprisingly, is my favorite day of the week.

One Amy Day, I headed for the library. I found a cozy spot—just across from a homeless man, sound asleep in his chair—and settled in to read a book. I pulled several books from my bag, stacked them on the table next to me, and selected a biography about Amy Carmichael, missionary to India. Amy Carmichael left behind her family’s wealth and comfort in Ireland, sacrificed everything she knew and loved, and started an orphanage in Dohnavur. She labored for 55 years without returning home on furlough. Fifty-five years! She could’ve used an Amy Day.

I devoured the biography, pausing only to underline the good lines and dab my eyes at the sad ones. After about two hours, I noticed that my napping neighbor was now awake, but he still remained perfectly still. He stared blankly at the patch of gray carpet between us. He never raised his eyes to meet mine, never glanced at the newspapers by his side, never shifted in his chair at all. But all at once, as though someone had called his name from another room, he suddenly stood up and rushed out. Just left—so abruptly that it startled me. My eyes followed him through the rows of books and out the door, and looked back down again toward my book.

And then it hit me. As though I had been the one sleeping, my spirit finally jolted awake. I realized the shameful irony of what I’d been reading, versus what I’d been doing. Only then did it occur to me that I could’ve—should’ve!—done something to help that man. I, with a wallet of cash and credit cards. I, with a granola bar and liter-sized water bottle in my book bag. And I, with my Bible—the one I claim to know so well—on top of that pile of books next to me. Here was a man who needed so much, directly across from a person who had so much, and I did nothing. It simply didn’t occur to me.

How self-absorbed. How apathetic. How unlike Jesus Christ. I had truly made “Amy Day” all about me. I had been reading about Amy Carmichael—even taking notes on her devotion and service!—and yet learning absolutely nothing. Her poem If described me well:

I shut the book, closed my eyes and confessed to God that I truly knew nothing of His Calvary love.

God, forgive me! Forgive my apathy and complacency and selfishness. Open my eyes to the people You love, and to the ways that I can serve them…because Jesus came to serve me. Let me be a doer, not just a hearer. I want to love like Jesus, wholeheartedly, consistently, and not just when it occurs to me. Amen.