Monday Muse ~ Thanks For People
- Tom Roes
- Oct 6, 2010
- Series: The Monday Muse
There were many things that we didn’t have overseas that we don’t even think about here. Hot water for example - I didn’t even think about how nice it is that hot water came out of the shower this morning when I stepped in. I never consider it unless for some reason only cold water comes out! When we were overseas we only had cold water and if we wanted hot water we had to heat it up. In Indonesia the weather was so hot that we didn’t mind having cold showers, but in Kyrgyzstan it gets cold and snowy in the winter like here, so there was a separate room with a metal tank of water with a place to build a fire underneath. When we wanted to bathe it would take half a day to heat the water and get everyone cleaned.
Washing machines are another convenient thing here that we never think about until they break! In Kyrgyzstan we didn’t have an automatic washing machine until our last year there. In Indonesia there were no washing machines, at least not in the village that we lived. Instead we hired a neighbour lady to take our clothes down to the river where everyone did their laundry.
I can still see the women as they were walking down the path to the river to do laundry. They would wrap a towel around their head to form a base where they would place a big basin full of dirty clothes and carry it down to the river. And when they were finished they would carry the basin full of clean, wet clothes back to their home where they would hang it on the wash line to dry.
But even with all of these things that were less convenient than what we have here, the most difficult thing about living overseas for us was not the lack of hot water, or washing machines, but rather is was being far away from the people that we love. Holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas were always difficult because we knew that our families were gathering together over a table full of great food, and laughing and joking together without us. We missed them and longed to be with them.
Lynette is from British Columbia and most of her family lives out there. And so we don’t see them nearly as much as we would like to. So we make the most of the times that we do have together. Next month we are all going out there to spend some time with them and are planning to have a Christmas in November with them!
The older I get the more I appreciate the people that are important to me, and the more I desire to work at fixing the relationships that are not quite what they should be. There are a number of verses in the Bible that talk about our relationships with other people. Here are a few of them:
Romans 12
9 Don’t just pretend to love others. Really love them. Hate what is wrong. Hold tightly to what is good. 10 Love each other with genuine affection, and take delight in honoring each other.
John 15
12 This is my commandment: Love each other in the same way I have loved you. 13 There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.
Ephesians 4
2 Always be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults because of your love.
1 Peter 3
8 Finally, all of you should be of one mind. Sympathize with each other. Love each other as brothers and sisters. Be tenderhearted, and keep a humble attitude. 9 Don’t repay evil for evil. Don’t retaliate with insults when people insult you. Instead, pay them back with a blessing. That is what God has called you to do, and he will bless you for it.
1 Peter 4
8 Most important of all, continue to show deep love for each other, for love covers a multitude of sins.
1 John 3
18 Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions. 19 Our actions will show that we belong to the truth, so we will be confident when we stand before God.
As we think about Thanksgiving this year, there are two things that I am the most thankful for. First of all I am thankful for what God has done for me. He has blessed me and my family beyond what I could have imagined. Secondly I am thankful for the people in my life. I am so grateful that I have close relationships with my extended family. With broken relationships being the norm these days I realize more and more that my family is unusual. I don’t want to ever take that for granted.
I hope and pray that each of you have people in your lives that you are thankful for this Thanksgiving.
1 Corinthians 13
1 If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. 3 If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.
4 Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud 5 or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. 6 It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. 7 Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.
8 Prophecy and speaking in unknown languages and special knowledge will become useless. But love will last forever! 9 Now our knowledge is partial and incomplete, and even the gift of prophecy reveals only part of the whole picture! 10 But when full understanding comes, these partial things will become useless.
11 When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things. 12 Now we see things imperfectly as in a cloudy mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.
13 Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.