Bread on the Highway

Life’s Oddities Don’t Have to Just be Odd

Driving into town early one wintry morning, I was thinking through my list of errands when I spied a strange object in the middle of the road.

As I zoomed by, it looked like a loaf of bread. How odd! Fortunately, I live in a place where the most logical explanation for a loaf of bread being in the middle of the road is that the wind blew it out of the back of someone’s pickup as they were heading home from the grocery store.

Is that bread on the highway?

Curiosity got the better of me, so at the next side road, I pulled a U-turn and went back to investigate. It was indeed bread. Picking it up, I noticed that although it was a super-soft artisan loaf, it wasn’t even squished. The bag wasn’t one bit dirty.

The bread I found on the highway!

I smiled at my free food, but as I set the loaf of bread on the car seat beside me, a story from my long-ago childhood flashed to mind.

It was part of a collection entitled “Uncle Arthur’s Bedtime Stories.” This short story was set in Russia after the revolution.

A family of orphaned children were living with their grandma. With no income, there came a day when Grandma had to tell the children that they had eaten the last crust of bread in the house.

There was nothing they could do but pray. When it was the little girl’s turn, she prayed specifically for “not just a crust, but a whole loaf, please.” For them, asking for a whole loaf was like asking for a whole buffet of desserts!

After they all prayed, the little girl had Grandma sharpen the bread knife, and they waited and waited. With hungry tummies, they finally got ready for bed when suddenly, there was a knock on the door. A family friend had arrived, saying that he had felt impressed that they needed help. He had walked 20 miles to bring them… a whole loaf of bread!

Thinking back on that story, my mindset immediately changed. Throughout all my errands that day, I was on the lookout, because I half-expected to find someone who needed a loaf of bread!

My thoughts shifted to thinking about other people’s needs instead of just my own.

But, shouldn’t that be my focus every day? I couldn’t help but wonder.

That evening at suppertime, after hearing about my “highway bread” discovery and my search for someone who might need a loaf of bread, my family thought of someone whom we knew needed a hand-up.

Together we had great fun “shopping” for them from our pantry and freezer, filling a box of food for delivery – a box with more than just a loaf of bread.

The oddities in life, like “highway bread,” don’t have to just be odd. Let God give your brain a U-turn and steer you – and your family – towards helping others.