Not long ago I heard a speech given by Vietnam veteran Richard Pimentel. He spoke about his upbringing by his grandmother and the struggles she went through and the embarrassing conversations about her to insure he had food on the table. A man very loudly chastised her in the grocery store about using food stamps to pay for her food and how he was the one paying for her government help through his taxes. The man wanted to know how she would ever pay him back and what she owed to society.
Pimentel, who was eight years old at the time, was with his grandmother during this confrontation and heard how she was being taunted. She pulled her grandson from behind her and showed him to the man. She said, “I will never be able to pay back what I have been given but this young man will grow up and he will pay you back in ways that you cannot imagine.”
Pimentel and many young men like him became a soldier in the army and served their country in Vietnam. He told of one experience when his platoon was being overrun by the Vietcong and his commanding officer ask for five of his soldiers to stay behind and give cover so the other soldiers could escape and not be killed or taken as prisoners. Pimentel asked why he was chosen to stay and his commanding officer said because, “It is your responsibility.”
He then concluded that responsibility was really two words: response and ability. All of us have abilities but how do we respond to those abilities? An ability that we all should possess is that we need to believe in ourselves and teach others to believe in themselves. As any good leader will tell you it is not how well someone believes in you but how much one believes in himself or herself.
It is our responsibility as a Christian to love one another and help one another if we can. It is not our responsibility to judge someone but it is our responsibility to help those in need if we have the ability to do so. There are going to be occasions when we will not see the end results and wonder have we done anything that is good or positive? If we use our abilities that the Lord has given us and we respond to the needs of those around us or to the jobs given us then we have completed our responsibility.
It is not up to us to see the end results. The Lord told us to plant the seed and He will reap the harvest. If we will respond and use our abilities to help and nurture those around us then we will be rewarded in ways that we cannot imagine!
