The adoptive parents waited with glee for the phone call that would tell them to come and get their newborn baby. The phone call did come, but with an apologetic tone: "We are sorry to inform your prospective baby has been born with deformities: a cleft palate, a twisted arm and leg, and a hare-lip." With little hesitation, they exclaimed, "We'll take it."
A series of operations reformed limbs and repaired facial and other deformities, till at last the little girl had a healthy and pretty body. Needless to say, the process was a trial of ordeal and expense.
One day, came a casual question from a friend, "Why on earth did you put yourself through such an ordeal when you could have had a healthy baby by waiting a while?"
The proud mother replied, "Well, somebody had to love her, and I decided it might as well be me."
Here at Forest Hill we still have some 'deformities' that need mending. We are not reaching the local lost as we should. More effort would help. More money would help. Perhaps some of the blame could be traced to the leadership not finding enough meaningful work for us to do, but we have an acute deformity of having much of the BODY missing from our assemblies. (Last Sunday was a good and notable exception; may it be an inspiration to us). The rest of the body that attend worship misses you, and senses a very real emptiness when you are away. Some parts of the body are carrying a disproportionate part of the load because of those 'bent legs' who do not carry their own part.
The only ones we have to look to, as we face a new year, are ourselves and God. Somebody has to care enough. Somebody has to be the one. We should ask a question: "Would it might as well be me?" It might as well be me!
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