January 25, 2017 (Wednesday)
Everything went as planned with the cataract surgery. I’m doing fine. I’ll see my local doctor this afternoon and get checked up.
My heartfelt thanks to Phyllis Goodin Smith for driving her car and taking me to Victoria and back home for the surgery. She has done the same for others. She is a great lady.
Sort of reminded me of a day 74 years ago when my grandfather and I rode a bus from the north side of Houston to the south side for me to have my tonsils removed. After the surgery we took the bus back home. Actually, we took two buses each way, having to transfer along the way.
Before that, when I was 5 years old, my father and uncle took me to a clinic in my father’s car to have treatment for a broken collar bone. We got to the clinic and I refused to get out of the car. The problem was solved only when they promised me ice cream.
Daddy took me to a doctor when I was about ten years old because I had stabbed my foot with a pocket knife while playing mumble peg with a bunch of boys one summer. The wound immediately got infected and my foot swelled up to twice its normal size. The doc cleaned the wound and treated it in a process that could be described as surgery, giving me only a stick of chewing gum as anesthetic.
Those were not the only times in my life when someone has done for me what I could not do for myself. I’ve been the recipient of help from others time and time again.
Sometimes we are blessed by receiving help and sometimes we are blessed by giving help. We are blessed by both experiences.
Jesus promises reward to those who help others. A day will finally arrive when we stand before Him in judgment and hopefully we will hear Him say to us, “..Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me..Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me” (Matthew 25:34ff NIV).