On Being Whole

Accidents happen everyday. We only have to flip through the newspapers every morning to be confronted by news of accidents. And I do not simply mean accidents involving vehicles. We see machines cutting off the limbs of factory workers, we read about firecrackers exploding onto people during festive season, causing them to lose fingers or scarring them horribly. Healthy old ladies that got hit by buses while crossing the road. And it happens in split seconds. One moment you're fine, and the next moment.....catastrophe.

I remember an incident that happened some time ago at my apartment block, resulting in a woman losing 3 of her fingers in matter of seconds. Her fingers had rested on a door frame when a sudden and unexpected gust of strong wind blew the door shut. It slammed right onto her fingers, crushing all three at once. She was sent to the hospital, and the fingers were amputated. In a blink of an eye, she lost part of herself.

Through life, we have contributed our fair share of grumblings about backaches, sore shoulders, arthritis, and even gout. True, it's hard to be optimistic and laugh the pains and aches away when the affected part inflicts much misery on us. And in the midst of our sufferings, we frequently question God of the trials and tribulations he put us through. But we seldom stop to think that........we should at least thank God we still have the fingers for arthritis to attack, or that we still have feet and shoulders for us to sprain!

Perhaps now is a good time to start appreciating the various parts of our bodies which God helps us preserve and which we've long taken for granted. We could start by being more self-reliant, putting our limbs to good use. Walk the short distance to the kitchen for a glass of water instead of hollering for the hired help. Clean up after ourselves instead of waiting for others to do it in our stead. The goal of employing foreign maids is not to turn us into lazy lumps of couch potatoes.

And every night, if we climb into our warm beds as whole as we have been in the morning, pray and thank God that we've made it safely through another day.