While running to the pharmacy and also picking up repaired glasses, I began to think about others: those who live in impoverished areas right here in our own community, those in areas of almost unprecedented flooding and devastating storms, and those in war-torn countries. What made me think of them was the fact that I was taking a leisurely ride to shops near me while others live amid houses most of us would not enter-or couldn’t enter because of destruction.
Some have told me in the past that it made them feel guilty to have many things while others have so little. Others have told me that they feel incredibly grateful and blessed to have what we have.
There is a third group that causes me as much trouble as the inequity of distribution of blessings. This is the group that neither feels empathy for those without, nor grateful for what you and I call blessings. In fact, this third group causes me even more concern than those who have little or nothing. It’s because they have the erroneous assumption that either they are entitled, or have gotten where they are by themselves.
In 1624, John Donne wrote a prose piece entitled, “Devotions on Emmergent Occassions.” The phrase, “no man is an island,” is a line from that work and has inspired a movie, a book, and several songs. One of my favorite versions is a recording by The Lettermen, a group I saw in person a couple of times when I was a youth. And, when I was in a men’s chorus in high school, we sang it. I suggest you Google it; but, please try to find either The Lettermen’s version, or that of the Victoria Chorale. Either is very moving.
Indeed, none of us is completely self-sufficient. Each of us owes something to someone, maybe unknown. In addition, through the last several millennia, it has been made more than apparent that any nation that thinks it can be totally self-sufficient is doomed to all. Each week, we have an opportunity to remember in worship where all of our blessings originate.
Put God at the top of the list and join us in worship each Sunday.
Michael O’Bannon, Pastor
