Saving All My Love
Dancing In The Present
Over these past few days after learning about Whitney Houston's death, the world have exclaimed how much they loved her, her voice and her songs. They've held vigils and reminisced about what her life and songs meant to them. The reality that she will no longer record another song, perform in another movie or sing on stage causes us to think about what her life actually meant to us.
When they leave, the celebrities of this world who were so prominent in the public's eye and underwent so much scrutiny for just being human, we exclaim how much we loved them. Why? While they were amongst us we were more concerned with their deficiencies than we were about celebrating them.
Wow! What is that? Silence! They can't hear us!
Maybe, just maybe, if we had poured out all this love on them while they were still alive, just maybe they would still be here.
We are captivated with the circumstances surrounding their death; but we were no less captivated when they fell down in life. Sometimes, especially our media, we said some cruel things about them. Our love, compassion and understanding for their deficiencies in life were almost non-existent. In return, it caused them to go deeper into the crevices of their reality in order to avoid not being loved and appreciated.
Afterwards when they take their last breath, we pour words of appreciation and expressions of our unfailing love for them and their talents. They take on this iconic persona and become bigger than life. In actuality, they could never live up to what they become in death. Interestingly enough, in death they obtain what they sought after in life; the admiration and respect of their fans and the world. How interesting it took them dying just to obtain it.
It is so easy to take for granted a life. It reminds me of an episode of Little House on the Praise where an elderly woman faked her death. She did it for one purpose. She wanted her children to come visit her and she knew that as long as she was alive they would be too busy and wouldn't come. But, once they heard that she had died they would drop everything they were doing and would be there. She was right!
They did come to memorialize her. Just at the right moment she came from behind the curtains and confronted them. They were amazed and felt deceived. Yet when she began to explain to them how much she needed to hear how much they loved her and to see them, they also realized her desperation.
We become consumed with the busy-ness of our lives that sometimes we forget to pay homage to those who are still living. Yes, just like that woman's children we will drop everything to go and pay our respect to the dead. Wasn't it Jesus who said, "Let the dead bury the dead?"
While they live, let's celebrate them. I know there is someone in your midst who needs to know that they are appreciated and their life means something. They need to know that they are loved. There is someone who needs to know that they are more than just an inconvenience.
What if they deceived us? What if they mocked their death? We would be infuriated with them just like the elderly woman's children.
But, what if we loved them? What if we showed them how much we appreciated them before they took their last breath? What if we stop saving all our love and give it to them while they are living? Maybe just maybe they would be with us longer and we could dance with them in the present.
Copyright � 2012. All Rights Reserved.
Jacqui A. Showers., The Showers Group Ministries
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