Alexander the Great and Diogenes: The Lesson About Human Worth
The famous conqueror of the ancient world,
Alexander the Great one day came across the philosopher Diogenes. Diogenes was
staring attentively at a heap of bones. “What are you looking for?” asks
Alexander.
“Something that I cannot find” replied
Diogenes.
“And what might that be?”
“The difference between your father’s bones and those of his slaves”
Source: unknown.
The Crumpled $20 Bill Story: Your Value Never Changes
A well known speaker started his seminar by
holding up a $20 bill. In the room of 200, he asked, “Who would like this $20
bill?”
Hands started going up. He said, “I am
going to give this $20 to one of you but first, let me do this.” He proceeded
to crumple the dollar bill up. He then asked, “Who still wants it?” Still the
hands were up in the air.
“Well,” he replied, “What if I do this?”
And he dropped it on the ground and started to grind it into the floor with his
shoe. He picked it up, now all crumpled and dirty.
“Now who still wants it?” Still the hands
went into the air.
“My friends, you have all learned a very
valuable lesson. No matter what I did to the money, you still wanted it because
it did not decrease in value. It was still worth $20. Many times in our lives,
we are dropped, crumpled, and ground into the dirt by the decisions we make and
the circumstances that come our way. We feel as though we are worthless.
But no matter what has happened or what
will happen, you will never lose your value in God’s eyes. To Him, dirty or
clean, crumpled or finely creased, you are still priceless to Him.
Source: unknown
The Classroom Question That Changed Everyone's Perspective
During her second month of nursing school,
the professor gave the students a quiz. The last question stumped most people
in the class. It read “What is the first name of the woman who cleans the
school?”
All the students had seen the cleaning
woman several times. She was tall, dark-haired and in her 50s, but how would
any of them know her name? Before class ended, one student asked if the last
question would count toward their grade.
“Absolutely,” said the professor. “In your
careers you will meet many people. All are significant. They deserve your
attention and care, even if all you do is smile and say hello”.
The students never forgotten that lesson.
They also learned her name was Dorothy.
Source: reported in “Heart At Work” Editor: Jack Canfield and
Jacqueline Miller
The Elephant Man and the Transforming Power of Acceptance
The movie The Elephant Man tells
the true story of John Merrick. Merrick was born in the slums of England in
1862, and almost from birth experienced massive rejection due to his grotesque
appearance. Merrick suffered abnormalities that resulted in a large and
severely misshapen head, loose, rough skin, and twisted arms and legs.
His mother loved dearly, but died when he
was ten. His new step-mother didn’t take to him, and at twelve, he was expected
to work to contribute to the family finances. After two years working in a
cigar shop he was dismissed because his deformities meant he could not keep up
the required pace. His father found him a job, of all things, as a door-to-door
salesman.
This only accentuated Merrick’s
self-loathing. When people opened their doors and saw him people would
literally scream and slam the door in his face. Those who knew who he was
refused to answer their doors.
After this “failure” Merrick’s father began
beating him. Merrick wound up on the street and was rescued by a kindly uncle,
the only person who would help him out. Not wishing to further burden his uncle
Merrick left to live in a squalid workhouse for drunks, cripples and the
mentally ill. His life there was so miserable that he offered himself to a
carnival owner as a sideshow act.
Merrick was a hit. People would pay money to line up and observe him like some animal in a zoo. But the carnival finally provided him with security and a place he belonged. It was while the sideshow was in London that Merrick met Dr Frederick Treves. Disgusted by Merrick’s treatment Treves wanted to help.
He gave Merrick his card, but lost track of
him.
The police started clamping down on the
sideshows, so Merrick was sent to Belgium to work in a sideshow there. But when
Belgian police also clamped down Merrick was forced to make his way back to
England. As he limped down Liverpool Street station, foul smelling and
misshapen, a crowd gathered simply to watch him.
The police took him aside to sort things
out, but Merrick’s speech was so slurred by his deformities that they couldn’t
understand him. It was at this point Merrick showed them Dr Treves’ card. The
police sent someone to get him, and Treves rushed back.
He took Merrick back to London hospital and
began a newspaper appeal for funds to help Merrick. The response was very warm,
and soon sufficient that Merrick was able to have his own house on the hospital
grounds with permission to live there permanently.
Treves’ care marked a real turning point
for Merrick. At first Merrick would act like a frightened child and hide when
anyone came into his room, but over time he began to engage some in
conversation. Dr Treves discovered that Merrick was in fact highly intelligent
and sought to nurture his growth. Yet Merrick’s greatest hurdle was still to
fall.
All his life Merrick had known only fear
and rejection from women. They had literally run from him. So Dr Treves asked
an attractive widow he knew if she could come into Merrick’s room, smile at him
and shake his hand. When she did Merrick broke down into a ball of tears, later
telling Treves that she was the first woman in his life apart from his mother
to have showed him kindness.
That was a breakthrough moment for Merrick.
In the coming years more and more people, women included, would meet him and
show him kindness.
He began meeting Countesses and Duchesses.
He even had many visits and letters from the Princess of Wales, forming a
friendship with her. Throughout this time Dr Treves reports Merrick changed
dramatically. He began to develop some self-confidence, to spend time traveling
in the country, to discuss poetry with another new friend, Sir Walter Steel.
Merrick died in April 1890. His deformities
had never allowed him to sleep lying down as most people do. He had to sleep in
a sitting position, his head resting on his knees. He apparently tried one
night to sleep lying down, to be more “normal”, and sadly dislocated his neck
and died.
Merrick’s story shows us the power of love
and acceptance.
Rejected all his life, treated as a
“thing”, it was the loving welcome of others that liberated him to become all
he could be. His life was made tragic not by his deformities but by
the response people made to them.
Source: Reported at
www.elephant-house.fsnet.co.uk
A Sermon Illustration About Every Person's Importance
Sir Michael Costa was a great orchestral Conductor of the 19th Century. It is said that one day he was conducting a rehearsal in which the orchestra was joined by a great choir. Midway through the session the piccolo player stopped playing.
It seemed innocent enough –
after all who would miss the tiny piccolo amidst the great mass of instruments
blazing away? All of a sudden Sir Michael stopped the entire orchestra and
choir. “Stop! Stop! Where’s the piccolo? What’s happened to the piccolo?”
We may sometimes feel like that piccolo
player – that we don’t have much to offer, that if we stopped our ministry no
one would notice anyway. Yet the Great Conductor notices, and needs us to
complete his orchestral masterpiece!
The Cemetery Wall Story Every Christian Should Hear
It is said that during the Second World War
some soldiers serving in France wanted to bury a friend and fellow soldier who
had been killed. Being in a foreign country they wanted to ensure their fallen
comrade had a proper burial.
They found a well-kept cemetery with a low
stone wall around it, a picturesque little Catholic church and a peaceful
outlook. This was just the place to bury their friend. But when they approached
the priest he answered that unless their friend was a baptised Catholic he
could not be buried in the cemetery. He wasn’t.
Sensing the soldiers disappointment, the
priest showed them a spot outside the walls where they could bury their friend.
Reluctantly they did so.
The next day the soldiers returned to pay
their final respects to their fallen friend but could not find the grave.
“Surely we can’t be mistaken.
It was right here!” they said. Confused, they approached the priest who took them to a spot inside the cemetery walls. “Last night I couldn’t sleep” said the priest. “I was troubled that your friend had to be buried outside the cemetery walls, so I got up and moved the fence.”
Source: Unknown
David Suzuki's Childhood: A True Story About Identity and Human Worth
David Suzuki is one of the world’s best
known campaigners for the environment. He is a respected and regarded citizen
of his homeland Canada. Many people are unaware however of the painful memories
Suzuki has from childhood.
On December 7, 1941 the Japanese airforce bombed Pearl Harbour and so Japan entered the Second World War. People of Japanese descent were immediately suspect in Canada. Within nine days of the bombing they were required to register with the authorities as “enemy aliens”.
Their
property was confiscated, their bank accounts were frozen and they were told
they would have to leave their homes.
David Suzuki was five years old at the
time, and his parents were second generation Canadians…of Japanese descent. By
the time David turned he, his mother and his sisters were sent to an internment
camp in British Columbia. His father was sent to work on a road gang, rejoining
his family in the camp a year later. The conditions were filthy and cramped.
Toward the end of the war the internees
were given a choice.
The Canadian government would pay for them
to move to Japan, or they could remain in Canada, on condition that they lived
east of the Rocky Mountains. Japanese-Canadians were no longer welcome in the
Suzuki’s hometown of Vancouver. David’s family chose to remain in Canada,
destitute and in poverty.
The entire episode left a terrible legacy in David Suzuki’s life. Proud to be Canadian he began to despise his Japanese descent and his Asian appearance. For years as a teenager he saved money for an operation to enlarge his eyes and dye his hair. He refused to walk down the street with his parents because he felt ashamed of them.
His father drummed
into him that to do well with white people he would have to be twice as good as
them.
Even today Suzuki struggles with the past.
He says “The terrible burden I’ve had all my life is that I seem to be
constantly trying to reaffirm to Canadians that I’m a worthwhile human being.
It’s really ridiculous to be 64 years old and still feel that you’ve got to
prove to them that you’re not somebody who should be locked up.”
Source: Information reported in the Sydney
Morning Herald Good Weekend Magazine, April 8, 2000
The Tiny Fish That Teaches a Big Lesson About Hidden Worth
The Frillfin Goby is an ugly little fish, 10-15 centimeters long, that lives in tropical and sub-tropical regions around the world.
You find them in rock pools. See a goby and you’re not likely to
give it much thought. It’s not pretty like so many tropical species, nor is it
impressive in size, nor is it any good to eat. It’s just an ugly, nondescript
little fish swimming in rock pools.
But it is a remarkable creature. When
you’re a fish living in a rockpool the biggest danger is birds who see you as a
fine meal. Not really many places to run and hide. The goby however has
developed an incredible technique to escape. It can fling its 10 centimetre
body into a nearby rockpool, and if necessary to another, then another, and on
and on.
The reason this is incredible is that the
goby is jumping blind. It cannot see the rock pool into which it will leap, yet
manages to jump with amazing accuracy.
How does the goby do this? Scientists have
discovered that at high tide the goby swims around the rocky areas and makes a
mental map of the landscape, noting where the depressions that will form rock
pools are. It can do this with just one pass of an area! Then, from memory, it
is able to leap from rock pool to rock pool.
The goby has a pea size brain, yet is able
to accomplish this stunning feat.
I don’t know about you but the Frillfin
Goby fills me with joy and wonder. It’s another reminder of the
remarkable world in which we live.
The Frillfin Goby also teaches us to look
for the remarkable in others.
Source: information about the Goby from
Braithwaite, Do Fish Feel Pain?
A Powerful Story About the Value of Every Soul
In the seventeenth century France a
humanist scholar by the name of Muretus was an ailing fugitive. When he
presented himself to the medical doctors he was dressed in the rags of a
pauper.
The doctors discussed his case in Latin,
thinking he would not be able to understand them. “Faciamus experimentum in
anima vili” one said, which means “Let us try an experiment with this worthless
creature”.
Imagine their shock when this pauper
replied, also in Latin, “Vilem animam appellas pro qua Christus non dedignatus
est mori?”, “Will you call worthless one for whom Christ did not disdain to
die?”
Source: Reported in Charles Birch, Regaining
Compassion (University of NSW Press, 1993)
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