Planting seeds has become our way of living out our everyday faith
By Andy and Lisa Hiles
For us, faith in the Lord Jesus as our Savior is foundational to who we are as individuals and as a couple. This belief came to Lisa as a child and has grown over time. In contrast, I needed a guide (thank you, Dean Collins!) and many hours with the Bible, apologetics resources, and others.
A series of posts by one of Dean’s friends
telling us how they pursue the challenge of daily obedience to Jesus.
I share this background only to say that we are doing our best to walk the clear path Christ provided us: love God, serve others (Matthew 22:35-40).
Part of loving God is our prayer life. Recognizing God’s constant presence in our lives, we give thanks at every meal, and begin/end each day asking for guidance, understanding, and acceptance. As Catholics, we attend Mass and pray the Rosary.
Serving Others
When she was unable to travel abroad on mission trips at the start of the pandemic, Lisa prayed for inspiration and felt the Lord calling her to make sandwiches for the homeless.
What began in our garage in March of 2020 is now 29 weekly collection sites and numerous faith-based and unaffiliated distribution partners. The Sandwich Project (check us out on Facebook and join in!) continues to grow, and to date we have delivered over 670,000 sandwiches to our homeless and food-insecure brothers and sisters in the Atlanta area.
At work, the Lord guided me to focus on health equity for low-wage workers and their families. (Health care affordability is a problem for 45 million Americans covered under their employer’s plan.)
In 2018, I approached our CEO about taking this on, and she approved my request. In 2019 we deployed the first at-scale analytic platform helping companies see exactly where the health of their lower-wage workers was falling behind (and what this means to the company’s bottom line).
Today we are implementing solutions that make sense for businesses and workers.
I am also educating college students on this issue by teaching a class on health equity at the University of Notre Dame, and closer to home I have given presentations at Emory University and the University of North Georgia.
What’s next?
It started at home with one loaf of bread (a seed), and Lisa’s prayerful willingness to let the Lord guide the development of The Sandwich Project. At work, an idea about using data to engage businesses in more thoughtfully considering the special health challenges facing lower-wage workers is gaining traction across corporate America (another seed).
We are not sure what’s next, but we will continue to pray—offering thanks, asking for guidance—and planting seeds where we can.
Maybe you have a seed to plant?
Lisa is the founder of The Sandwich Project, serving the food insecure and homeless in the Atlanta area since 2020. Andy is a vice president with a large healthcare company and a part-time instructor at the University of Notre Dame. They have three adult children and are very active in their faith community.
“Lisa and I are humbled that Dean asked us to contribute to his website,” Andy wrote. “Dean has been a beacon of light for us on several occasions, so if he believes we have something helpful to say, then here goes.”
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