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Greater Good


Do not withhold good from those who deserve it, when it is in your power to act. Do not say to your neighbor, “Come back later; I’ll give it tomorrow”— when you now have it with you. (Proverbs 3:28-29) 

          I like the idea of doing good works, not because they’ll get me into heaven, but because of the helper’s high. Doing good makes me feel good. I keep telling myself that someday, I want to be able to do this, or that, and to donate the other. When someone comes to me with a request, however, I’m often too busy, or I can’t be away from Dad, or I don’t have money… There’s always an excuse, and some of those excuses are true, legitimate, and valid. There are other times, however, when the reality is that I don’t want to do or donate as much as I want the security of holding on to the money.  
          I think today’s passage is the flip side of something I’ve written in the past. I’ve said that the evil that we are tempted to do is more evil than the evil we aren’t tempted to do, even if the evil we’re tempted to do seems insignificant. It is, therefore, more evil to eat a nice, big, yummy spoonful of peanut butter than it is to commit murder – for me. Someone else might not have a problem with peanut butter, but struggle with stealing, or reading bodice-rippers, or something else. In the same way, the good that we do is more good than the good that we dream. Donating yellow squash to the food pantry is more good than think it’d be cool to use my truck to help people move something. I also have a dream of someday being able to set up focused villages, in which a certain number of houses are dedicated for the use of single parents, and an equal number for widows, and part of the deal of living there is that the widows mentor the single parents while the single parents help the widow with chores. I think such a community could do a great deal of good. Using my truck to help someone move is far more realistic and possible now. 
          I have dropped off the yellow squash. I have picked up the trash along the road. Those  aren’t big, glamorous tasks, but better the petty and obvious task that is done than one that is merely a dream.

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