Opus 2025-470: Every Blessing Has a Clouding Lining

I am truly blessed.  I accept that.  I rejoice in that.  This morning it occurred to me that the other side of blessing could very well be responsibility.

I am blessed with good health.  That’s what struck me this morning as I was thinking about all the different issues that my wife is going through.  I think we’re to the point where almost every organ and joint that can be dealt with has been removed or replaced.  Even with that she now came up with a totally unexpected attack of shingles.  And that was added on top of everything else going on, not a later addition.

The responsibility of those of us blessed with good health is to have compassion and understanding towards those who don’t.  In my case I’m dealing with someone who does not respond well to pain.  She gets irrational and aggressive.  I can do nothing right.  I am supposed to be able to read her mind and know the future.  That isn’t going to happen.  What can happen is that I can practice love.  Remember that the first characteristic that Paul tells us love involves is patience or as the KJV says “long suffering”.  I can relate to that.

Or take the fact that it seems we have an adequate income to meet our needs.  It’s easy to criticize those who are struggling.  It’s easy to look at their lives and see the wrong decisions they made.  It’s also very easy to miss the fact that many times it’s not really their fault.  It’s a time for compassion.  The same passage in Paul tells us that love is not arrogant and does not brag.  Difficult times call upon us to be more generous and to be more supportive of those who are struggling.

I don’t know all of the blessings that you have.  I’m not even sure that I know all the ways in which God has blessed me.  I continually thank him for the things that I’m not aware of or have forgotten.  Each of us needs to look at our blessings and see if there is a responsibility that we have towards our family, the body of Christ and our country.

The only result will be a better world.

homo unius libri