What difference does Lent make?

So we've been focusing on some of the "tools" used during Lent to assist us in introspection about ourselves and our part in the global and universal good, but really, why does it matter? Can one person really make a difference in this world? You may be thinking, "Sure, if you are Mother Teresa or the president of the United States, or someone really important, but just the average person? Nah." Well, I disagree.

There have been a few people in my life who had a tremendously positive influence on me. I'm sure you can think of a few in your own life if you try. Sometimes I think about how my life might have gone if I had not had those people in my life, or if they had not been the positive and loving influences they've been, and I think I can say with confidence that the world would have been a very different place if those people had not interacted with me the way they did.

It's like a ripple effect in a still pond. If you toss a pebble in the middle of the pond, no matter how small the pebble, you'll see rings ripple out all across the surface of the pond. Fish are darting, tiny single-celled creatures are activated. Maybe one of those fish that darts away from the disturbance of the ripple sees an insect on the surface of the pond and eats it. The insect's life is forever changed! Maybe the insect is a mosquito. Since it was eaten, maybe it never bites the man standing by the pond. Maybe the mosquito carries West Nile virus. Since it never bites the man he doesn't get sick. I can continue, but I think you get the point. One person can and does make a difference in the life of others. We don't even always know how or what we do, but what we do matters. That's why it's so important to take an inventory of who we are and how we act with others, and to strive to be the best we can be all the time. Because you just never know.

I'll give you a for instance from my life. As a young wife several years ago, I was thrilled to find out that after months of trying, I was pregnant. However, things did not go well, and after a long hospitalitzation, I gave birth to a son who died very shortly thereafter. For weeks a young female minister from my church had been visiting me in the hospital. Sometimes she would just sit with me and we would talk about nothing really. Other times we would talk about my fears and frustrations with the pregnancy. She officiated my son's funeral on a cold, rainy December day - just me, my husband, and Louise. She said the only real words of comfort I had during that dark time in my life, and even though we would go our separate ways and it would be 15 years before our paths would cross again, she had a profound impact on my life without even being aware of it. When I graduated from Emory with a master's in theology, I wrote to tell her what she had meant to me, and to thank her. I am a minister today partly as the result of her influence. She had no idea. You just never know when your kindness, your patience, your advice, your listening skills, your donation of money, etc., are going to save a life or radically change a life.

That's why it's so important to keep a "holy Lent" where you give sincere and conscious effort to becoming the loving member of this world that God wants. You just never know.

Be blessed, and be a blessing to others.
Teresa