THINK OF THESE – Beyond flaws

One fine Sunday afternoon, I had an opportunity of reading an e-mail forwarded to me by a friend. Attached to it was a story that made me ponder some thoughts. Allow me to share the story:
A lone figure set against the evening sky looked more like a painting than reality. His slow movement, however, confirmed he was real. The stark landscaped ached with desolation. The fissured land lay almost naked. Cattle limped around with bones protruding, and an occasional spurt of cactus stood in solitude where shrubs and trees once jostled together. In the midst of this landscape was a sprawling house with a pretty garden.
The water bearer was the silhouetted figure, balancing a pole across his shoulders with two pots suspended from it. Daily, he walked the parched land to a well, drew water and traced his way back to his master’s house. He was responsible for its water supply, but on one such journey, he noticed that one of the earthen pots had a crack.
The water bearer, who was in the habit of talking to his surroundings, found he was suddenly interrupted by a loud sigh. “Who did that?” he asked.
Picking up its cue, the cracked pot let out another sigh. “What is it?” the water bearer inquired.
“I’m sorry,” the cracked pot replied. “Why, what’s the matter?” the water bearer asked again.
“Oh, I’m useless,” the cracked pot bemoaned. “I keep leaking so much water. Look at my friend on the other side. He always delivers a full pot. He has reason to be proud.”
“Don’t worry,” the water bearer said. But the cracked pot could not suppress its feelings of failure.
Several days later, the water bearer stopped in his tracks and looked at the cracked pot. “Look down on your side of the pathway,” he said. “Do you see anything?”
“Yes,” the cracked pot sighed. “I see some grass and a few flowers.”
“You see,” the water bearer said, “I knew you were leaking, so I took advantage of it and planted seeds along your side of the path. And now, you’ve done me so proud. You have given life to the dry earth. And look at the grass, the flowers and the butterflies. Now, I can even cut some of these pretty flowers for my master’s vase. See, you may be a cracked pot but you have created beauty around you.”
Just like the cracked pot, we have also our flaws. No one is perfect. In fact, God is still working to make us what we ought to be. Many years ago, a boy was born in Russia whose mother died before his second birthday and his father dropped dead in the middle of the street when he was eight years old. After the death of his grandmother less than a year later, he and his four siblings were split up.
As if all these tragedies were not enough, the boy thought himself to be so ugly, he was certain there would be no happiness for him in life. He had a wide nose, thick lips, small gray eyes, and big hands and feet. He was so distraught about his ugliness, he asked God to work a miracle and turn him into a handsome man. He vowed that if God would do this, he would give Him all he possessed, as well as all he might possess in the future.
Do you know who that Russian boy was? He was no other than Count Leo Tolstoi, one of the world’s foremost authors in the twentieth century and the man behind the epic War and Peace.
In one of his books, he admitted that through the years he discovered that the beauty of physical appearance he had once sought was not the only beauty in life. Indeed, it was not the best beauty. Instead, he came to regard the beauty of a strong character as having the greatest good in God’s sight.
“There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion,” wrote Francis Bacon. John Keats added: “A thing of beauty is a joy forever: Its loveliness increases, it will never pass into nothingness.”
Obstacles are part of living. If Christopher Columbus had turned back, no one could have blamed him, but definitely no one would have remembered him. “When you cannot remove an object, plow around it. But keep plowing,” someone once said.
Beauty and poverty are no excuse for a person to be successful in life. Even being a handicap is no obstacle to fame. There was this man whose stutter was so severe that it deeply scarred his life. It was much worse when he was nervous, and only in the company of his closest friends did it disappear. His childhood was full of humiliating moments, such as the time he stuttered in school and the whole class screamed with laughter until the teacher pounded the desk and called him a fool. But it did not stop William Somerset Maugham to become one of the world’s most loved novelists.
Our purpose in life should be to see one another through, not through one another. Zig Ziglar, in his book, Something to Smile About, shares this story:
In the last century, a rich boy and a poor boy lived in the same neighborhood. The rich boy wore nice clothes, lived in a nice house, and had plenty of good, nutritious food to eat. The poor boy lived in a cheap house, wore ragged clothes, and did not have much of anything to eat.
One day, the two boys got into a scuffle. In the struggle, the rich boy won. The poor boy got up, dusted himself off, and told the rich kid that if he had the proper food to eat as the rich boy did, he would have emerged the winner.
Then, the poor boy tuned and walked away. The rich kid just stood there – speechless. He was numbed by what the poor boy said. His heart was broken because he knew that what the poor boy said was true.
The rich boy never forgot that incident. From that day on, he revolted against any favored treatment because he was rich. He made it a point to wear inexpensive clothing; he intentionally endured the hardships faced by people who were poor. His family was often embarrassed by the way he dressed, but despite family pressure, the young boy never again took advantage of his wealth.
No one remembered now who the poor boy was. But the rich boy who developed such compassion for poor people made them his life’s work. His name is recorded in history. He dedicated his life to service and became a world-class physician, serving in Africa. His name was Albert Schweitzer.
This reminds me of the story of Oseola McCarty, a black American who grew up in Mississippi. She has spent most of her life helping people look nice – taking in bundles of dirty clothes, and washing and ironing them.
She quit school in the sixth grade to go to work, never married, never had children, and never learned to drive because there was no place in particular she wanted to go. Her work was her life. It was her way of being a blessing to others. When she started working, many black people in rural Mississippi didn’t even have a job.
For most of her 87 years, Oseola spent almost no money. She lived in her old family home. She saved her money, most of it coming in dollar bills and change, until she had amassed a little more than US$150,000. Then, she made what people in Hattiesburg are calling “The Gift.” She donated her entire savings to black college students in Mississippi.
“I know it won’t be too many years before I pass on… so I planned to do this. I planned it myself,” she was quoted as saying. She also said, “I wanted to share my wealth with the children.”
“Live simply,” someone once said, “so that others may simply live.”