The power of just one life by Colourful-Dave Longworth
This story was based on actual events and the author has recovered well since he wrote it some years before publishing it. Try and see the positive side of it, I am alive to write this………
Today I had a sleep. I suppose I’m still recovering from the overdose I took on Tuesday night. Today is Saturday and I feel like I should be working. I could be earning money but at least, at least, I’m alive. Surely that’s enough. Anyway back to my story……..I had a dream of which I’ve just woken up from. The dream was hard to understand at first, but when I woke from it I realized what it was and what it’s meaning was. I was in the future and I was meeting people whose lives I had touched and they were all much older than now. They had gone on and done wonderful things. And I realized I had touched their lives. I realized that had they not been encouraged by me they just may not have done those good things. And it was my encouragement,the ability to encourage which I believe came from God and not of human means which made all the difference in different ones lives. One was a youth leader, still only young in real life but he had gone on and was a youth director in a large church, his chosen vocation in life. For him I hardly remembered what I had said to him but it had touched him. All I had done was given $2, like the widows mite in the story Jesus had given all those years ago. It was more than I could afford but God had blessed it, along with some words to build him up in his work and now this man was doing great things for God!
Then there was the couple I grew up with in youth group. In real life they had married years ago and had young children. I actually saw them out as a family the night I attempted suicide. That night I was too caught up in my pain, but in the dream they were all much older now and what were in the present young children, now were all adults. That was not just one person but a whole family whose lives were different because of just one life, me who had encouraged the parents to remain together. In the dream were many lives too many to name. I even saw my dog; he had a chance to live because I took in an uloved but very loveable animal. He had touched others with his smile and his charm….
But, if I had died that night my dog would have been put to sleep, the young man I had met at church, the friends from youth group and the countless other lives would not have gone on.
Oh, but I am alive, I did not die. I have been given another chance. But what if the ambulance wasn’t called, my friend hadn’t found me? What if people thought he’s no good, he will never achieve anything, let him die. All the questions? All the what if’s?
Next time you see an addict in the gutter, a dirty aboriginal, an unwanted pet or YES YOU, all clean and respectable and feel like giving up, please don’t because you don’t know the power of just one life…..