Living it!

Reading a friend's blog yesterday, I was really struck by what had occurred.  I quote from her blog:

Our neighbours to the land called late last night with a request for a lift into the village as their car was stuck because of the snow and they live about 7km (4.3miles) outside the village. We didn't have much snow yesterday but we did have wind, accompanied by a 10 minute blizzard where our village disappeared from sight, and it meant that their road was not passable with an ordinary car, in fact it was barely passable with ours. The problem was the young lass needed to be in village the following morning, the only catch was that it was for 6:20am, an early start for Ian then. In our three years of living in Latvia we may not have learnt much of the oral language but we do feel we have learnt more about the culture and we feel accepted despite our failings with the language as our neighbours know they can rely on us when they get stuck.

They have found that helping others has paid off in that they are often invited to celebrations and special events by their neighbours and feel really included in their community.

It reminded me of an experience I had many years ago.  Our niece was to be married and we were going to the ceremony and celebrations with other members of the family.  We thought that everything was organised but when we got to the bus stop there were problems and we were unable to get the bus we needed and the next one was the next day.  We had to travel about 150 miles to where the wedding was being held.  My father-in-law mentioned this to a friend and he wasted no time in getting his car out and driving us all there and then returning - a round trip of about 300 miles.  I don't remember exactly what was said that day in the church but I will never forget that generous act of a friend.  

Of course it isn't just about giving someone a lift in a car.  In Acts 10:38, Peter, summing up Jesus' life said, 'He went around doing good.'  He crossed the accepted barriers of religion, class, sex and nationality.  He was totally inclusive because God loves the whole world and Jesus died for the whole world.  All those years ago, our friend, a Roman Catholic was a close friend to us who were evangelicals, a poignant fact in a Catholic country.  My present friend whose blog I quoted is British, living in a foreign country and not really understanding the language fully.  But it's not the words we speak that are remembered, but the way we live.

St Francis of Assissi on one occasion said that he and his companions would go into town and preach to the people and he added, 'we may even use words!'  Do we tell people that we are Christians and so we feel we should and also they expect us to act in a certain way or do they see the way we live and can tell that we are followers of Jesus?  Today on Facebook, a friend wrote that better than saying is doing, better than promising is making something become a reality.  As the years have passed, I realise that denomination and preaching are less important than the actual putting it into practice.  It's not the structure of the group we belong to that matters.  In fact I think that it is almost irrelevant.  People take notice of how we live.  It's the living it that counts.