Three Cheers for Chick-fil-A’s Decision to Open Last Sunday!

Some are calling it a “Christmas Miracle”!

I’m talking about Chick-fil-A’s decision to open yesterday (Sunday) in order to deliver thousands of meals to stranded passengers inside Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson airport.

A nearly 11-hour power outage crippled the world’s busiest transportation hub – and at the start of the busy Christmas travel season, no less.

The popular restaurant chain saw the need and worked with Atlanta’s mayor to help bring some timely and tasty relief.

My family jokes about wishing we could stop at Chick-fil-A on the way home from church, but honestly, I’m not at all surprised by their decision to break with their long-held tradition. I know the Cathy family and appreciate their heart for serving others.

In fact, when I heard about the story, I was immediately reminded of the account when Jesus healed a man on the Sabbath:

Again he entered the synagogue, and a man was there with a withered hand. And they watched Jesus, to see whether he would heal him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse him. And he said to the man with the withered hand, “Come here.” And he said to them, “Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill?” But they were silent. And he looked around at them with anger, grieved at their hardness of heart, and said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out, and his hand was restored. The Pharisees went out and immediately held counsel with the Herodians against him, how to destroy him. (Mark 3:1-6)

As Jesus demonstrated time and again, true Christianity isn’t just a dry set of rules and regulations. Ours is a dynamic and flexible faith. Yes, there are boundaries and standards. But as the late Dr. Adrian Rogers once said, “If you see God’s law as your enemy, that’s license. If you see God’s law as your master, that’s legalism.”

I’m certain that Chick-fil-A’s Dan Cathy and his team would heartily concur with such sentiment. Three cheers for Chick-fil-A’s compassionate and quick response.