Inspired by others

The Bible says there is nothing new under the sun. I take that as a general thought, for surely folks back in Bible times never had GPS, a recent deal for our finding out directions. To be correct, though, they musta had something similar - like reading different signs to get directions. In that respect, there is nothing new under the sun.

As a minister, I receive a lot of e-mail drops of inspiration, thought of and written by someone else. Sometimes I wonder, don't they know I know that? Doesn't everybody? After all, there is nothing new under the sun. Well, oftentimes I do find, or am brought to remembrance of, something really good. And while I might have known of it, of its importance, occasionally the drop prompts some really good thought for me. Others do inspire my thoughts. While it might not be new and different, it gives me focus to where I might not have been in a while.

Today the note of inspiration was a person who first thought it unimportant to visit a long ago friend who had lost a loved one. The point of the piece, the writer finally decided to go, and that seemed to be key to what the bereaved needed at the moment, even from a long ago friend.

But one does not have to be a minister to be inspired by others, and most times it is not a minister at all. Sometimes it is not even a friend. People, a lot of people, do and say good things that serve to keep us on the road that we ought to be on, even if it might not be a new whatever.

We need never to think that we have it all, that we have no need of others and what they think or do. Obviously, some of that needs to be avoided but there are lots worth paying attention to. And, we don't have to look to professionals, such as church ministers, to find stuff really of great worth. Proportionally, if you think about it, there are a lot more of them than us.

The subject here has to do with inspiration, and that toward doing the good and not the bad. While the word might could be used for both good and bad, I think of it in terms of the good. I think of it that way - inspired to do good by others.

We need to understand that little things really matter, too. What we are inspired to do does not have to be something grandiose. Fact is, a lot of it is rather simple - a smile, a kind word, a short email of concern, thanks, or praise; a card, whatever. Sometimes we so forget the little things; we forget how important little things are to others, folks who might just need that at the moment, which was to me the importance of that email drop today.