Khrietuonyü Noudi
According to a story written by Leo Tolstoy, there was once a king who was rich and well-respected by the people of his kingdom. The king was always on the lookout for more wisdom so that he could be of more use to his people. One day he summoned all the wise-men in his kingdom to his courtroom because he wanted to know three things. The three things were:
1) Who is the most important person for me?
2) When is the most important time?
3) What is the most important thing for me to do?
All the wise men who came to the meeting gave their own answers but the king was not satisfied and happy with any of the answers given. So the meeting concluded without the king finding any satisfactory answers to these three questions. But even after the meeting, the king was still on the lookout for satisfactory answers from anyone as he really wanted to know these three things.
At this time, a servant in the king’s palace mentioned to the king about a very wise old man living in the deep forest and that he may be able to answer these three questions. So the king decided to go to the forest to meet this old wise man. The king traveled for many days before he finally came to the hut of this old man.
The king told the hermit (the old man) that he had come to meet him because none of the wise-men in his kingdom was able to answer three things he wanted to know. After hearing the three questions of the king, the hermit narrated a story to the king and said that the most important persons for him are the persons with whom he is living or with whom he comes into contact, the most important time is now (the present time) and the most important thing to do is to do good to the people with whom he is living or comes into contact with. At last, the king was satisfied with all the answers and he went away happily.
Yes, how important it is to be in the people’s business and to be a ‘now’ person. Jesus himself said that when we give water to a thirsty man, food to a hungry man or clothes to a naked one, it is just like giving water, food or clothe to God himself because all men have been made in the image of God and that even such small deeds will never go unrewarded. When we do such small and trivial deeds, our actions may not be recorded by anyone in a register or record-book. But the Bible says that even such trivial deeds are precious and blessed in the sight of God and will bring forth its own reward in one way or the other sooner or later.
I feel that even through common sense, we can somehow say that God may not necessarily judge us for how we use our money, but God will certainly judge us for how we treat people and how we use the time and opportunities given to us. God’s patience for us is so great that even after we fail and dishonor Him time and time again, he is always ready to give us another chance.
One of my all-time favorite speakers is Joel Osteen. Mr. Osteen says that since human life and the future are unpredictable, we need to make investments in certain things so that we may be able to withstand and survive hard times that may come our way. But when we talk about investment, many people think only in terms of saving money in the bank or investing money in some projects or undertakings that are likely to yield huge dividends in the future. And of course, there is nothing wrong in investing our money in this kind of things. But Joel Osteen says that the best investment is ‘investing in people’. The yields of all other types of investment are limited only to life in this earth. The profits of these earthly investments will not go beyond life on earth. And once we die, all these investments will have no meaning and bearing on us.
But when we invest in people, we will reap the benefits, profits and blessings not only in this earthly life……but even after our life on this earth. At least, this is what we, as believers in Christ, can say and proclaim.
And the good news is that investing in people is something which anybody and everybody can do because we do not need to be rich to invest in people. But how do we invest in people? Investing in people basically would mean being good, loving, helpful and thoughtful towards our fellow beings. Or in other words, it means loving others with the love of God. Here in this investment, God is the record-keeper and He will reward all the doers in His own way and in His right time.
Joel Osteen also says that many people believe in leaving their children with a good inheritance. And thus many sons and daughters inherit huge sums of money, plump bank-accounts, lands, estates and properties from their rich fathers. All these show the love that a father has for his children. However, Osteen says that instead of leaving something “for” our children, we can do even better by leaving something “in” them. And we can leave something ‘in’ our children by properly rearing them up in the ways of the Lord especially during their formative years. Some of the ways through which we can do this is by setting an example for them with our lives, by nurturing them with the word of God, by letting them have the true wisdom and faith that is intended by God for mankind etc….
It is said that learning starts from cradle and continues till grave. Nobody is perfect and we are all in the learning process. And since we are all in the learning process, we are bound to fail and displease God and also hurt our fellow-beings. God knew very well that human beings would need a new beginning every now and then. I believe this is the reason why a year is divided into 12 months, a month into 4 weeks and a week into 7 days.
Every New Year is an opportunity to start afresh and anew. Likewise every new week and every new day is also an opportunity to discard our old wicked ways and walk afresh in the path of God. As the saying goes, ‘morning by morning new mercies I see’.
And in order for our deeds to be in right with men, first our relationship with God has to be in the right. We cannot treat people in the desired ways of God unless our relationship with God is in the right path in the first place. We might have failed people, disappointed many or even hurt people in the past, but another opportunity has come our way with this New Year to start afresh our journey by renewing our faith and commitment in God. It is important to be in favor with both God and man. But we cannot be in favor with man unless we are first in favor with God. If our relationship with God is in the right, our dealings with our fellow-beings will automatically flow in the right path as desired by God.
And in accordance with the saying that “a bird in hand is better than two in the jungle”, the good news is that we don’t have to go to a foreign land or select some person or time to start mending our ways, we can begin right here, right now with the people around…………
