Celebrate Others This Year

April 1st is usually an April fools day where we try to convince someone of something that isn’t real. This year feels like the whole world is living a fooled you kind of season. If we would have had someone tell us what the world would look like at this moment a few years ago we would have thought it was impossible. But here we are. I had a friend call for perspective this morning. She just needed me to go through the positives that can come from this rather than focusing on the negatives. I am so glad she called. Her call helped change my perspective as I really listed the things that will be better now and on the other side of this Covid 19 scare. It isn’t a scare but a reality. There are those who are losing loved ones and can’t even be by there side holding there hand and saying a last prayer. The one thing that I could list that is the most important to me perspective is time in prayer and His word. This is not a time to ask God for things but to ask how He can work through me.

Keeping others as a focus rather than turning our focus inward is key to getting through. I am sure each of us could list the my pain is greater than yours points. But even someone who loses a pet or has to cancel a pedicure could be suffering in ways we don’t understand. It isn’t for me to determine whose pain is greater and who is being entitled, spoiled brats. What I can pray is that each of us opens our eyes to what others’ needs are and how we can support one another in this difficult time. If it is a daughter standing outside a nursing home window or on video chat to stay connected with a parent. Celebrate it.  The person sitting glued to the twenty-four hour news channel watching the death ticker are so single focused on the score of how this virus is winning that they can’t see all the ways people are stepping in and stepping up to be there for each other. The lives that are lost shouldn’t be a scoreboard tally that places fear over faith in our lives. Faith in God but also faith in each other.

Yesterday I saw a video of a little boy doing backflips for cars that drove down his street if they would just honk their horn. His eyes are open to how he can brighten and connect with others even in this time when we can feel so alone. There are more stories of people reaching out than the ticks on who has been infected by this virus. We need a ticker to count all the kind acts of others.

Someone posted that we shouldn’t celebrate workers since they are not there by choice but because they need a paycheck. I totally disagree. There are those who courageously go to work in whatever role they have and make it possible for others to stay home and keep our germs to ourselves. Whether by the goodness of their heart or to do what must be done for their families we need to celebrate each other.

This is a year to embrace others anyway we can. This is a time to celebrate others anyway we can. There will be time again next year to pull a fast one on someone and chuckle when they realize they have been fooled. This year is the year to come together not as a community or nation but as a world knowing we are all in this together. Covid 19 has become the great equalizer. We are all in disbelief that our lives could be so changed but it is our reality.

In Him,
Joyful
4-1-20