I am honored each year to offer the invocation at the Komen Dallas Race for the Cure Luncheon sponsored and hosted by Strasburger & Price, LL,. This is the seventh year of the luncheon. Each year I am inspired and encouraged by the stories of survivors, the reports of leaps made in research, and the dollar totals raised worldwide to find a cure.
This year, a scientist who works for Komen spoke about two counties with the highest rate of breast cancer in America—Marin County, CA, and Madison County, MS. As a researcher, he wondered, “Why these counties and not some other county?”
Listening to him, I felt relieved that my address is Dallas County and not Marin or Madison counties. In actuality, though, breast cancer does not discriminate based on geography, race, age, income status or religious preference.
The fact that a woman in my family has not had breast cancer is either a gift of good health or luck of the genetic gene pool. As a friend who died too young of lymphoma used to say, “Health is a halo worn by the unaware.”
How do I become aware of all the halos I wear and blessings I receive? When it comes to counting my blessings, I wonder sometimes, “Why was I given so much and others given so little?” When amazing opportunities come my way, I wonder what is unique to my life.
I have not found an answer to my questions, yet, but there is a story that keeps me aligned with what God wants for my life. It is the Parable of the Talents, a story about what we’ve been given in life, including financial resources, and what we do with what we’ve been given.
This parable also teaches me that no matter what amount or level a person has been given, every person possesses the gift of giving. Utilizing that gift of giving means you have to do the hard work of identifying a need that can only be filled by someone like you and then taking that first step and doing something—anything—to generate momentum.
I have found that the way to identify a need is to pray. Ask God to show you a need. Then pray some more. Keep praying once that need is revealed. I often pray this one sentence: “Break my heart with what breaks yours” (from Hosanna by Hillsong).
Imagine the blessings that could be poured out on this world if each one of us took seriously the task of praying to be given a God-sized need that only we could meet. I invite you to pray. Then pray some more. Then keep praying.
Finally, being a woman is the greatest risk factor for having breast cancer. Health is a halo worn by the unaware, but, women can stay aware by doing monthly breast self-exams and keeping up with annual mammograms. Don’t wait.
This year, a scientist who works for Komen spoke about two counties with the highest rate of breast cancer in America—Marin County, CA, and Madison County, MS. As a researcher, he wondered, “Why these counties and not some other county?”
Listening to him, I felt relieved that my address is Dallas County and not Marin or Madison counties. In actuality, though, breast cancer does not discriminate based on geography, race, age, income status or religious preference.
The fact that a woman in my family has not had breast cancer is either a gift of good health or luck of the genetic gene pool. As a friend who died too young of lymphoma used to say, “Health is a halo worn by the unaware.”
How do I become aware of all the halos I wear and blessings I receive? When it comes to counting my blessings, I wonder sometimes, “Why was I given so much and others given so little?” When amazing opportunities come my way, I wonder what is unique to my life.
I have not found an answer to my questions, yet, but there is a story that keeps me aligned with what God wants for my life. It is the Parable of the Talents, a story about what we’ve been given in life, including financial resources, and what we do with what we’ve been given.
This parable also teaches me that no matter what amount or level a person has been given, every person possesses the gift of giving. Utilizing that gift of giving means you have to do the hard work of identifying a need that can only be filled by someone like you and then taking that first step and doing something—anything—to generate momentum.
I have found that the way to identify a need is to pray. Ask God to show you a need. Then pray some more. Keep praying once that need is revealed. I often pray this one sentence: “Break my heart with what breaks yours” (from Hosanna by Hillsong).
Imagine the blessings that could be poured out on this world if each one of us took seriously the task of praying to be given a God-sized need that only we could meet. I invite you to pray. Then pray some more. Then keep praying.
Finally, being a woman is the greatest risk factor for having breast cancer. Health is a halo worn by the unaware, but, women can stay aware by doing monthly breast self-exams and keeping up with annual mammograms. Don’t wait.
2 comments:
We along with Kathryn do share a heavy responsibility since we have been lavished with such a high amount of 'Talents'.
What if we took this parable from the individual perspective to the national perspective. The first question would be, "Which countries have been bleesed with many Talents?" This could be measured in lots of ways (and is). Taking frequently used measures for quality of life and human development (cost of living, culture & leisure, economy, environment, freedom, access & quality of health care, infrastructure, safety & risk, climate, literacy & education, income equality & poverty & social rights), the top 25 countries would rank generally in this order:
Rank Country Index
1 France 0.954
2 Australia 0.953
3 Netherlands 0.940
4 United States 0.932
5 New Zealand 0.926
6 Switzerland 0.915
7 Denmark 0.905
8 Italy 0.895
9 Norway 0.891
10 Luxembourg 0.890
11 Belgium 0.881
12 Austria 0.881
13 Spain 0.878
14 Germany 0.875
15 Finland 0.874
16 Canada 0.868
17 Sweden 0.860
18 Japan 0.859
19 Ireland 0.854
20 Argentina 0.849
21 Portugal 0.845
22 Malta 0.838
23 Iceland 0.832
24 Slovenia 0.831
25 United Kingdom 0.830
No matter how one measures, the United States would have to be considered in the top five (or ten) of the 195 countries. So we as a country have been overly blessed with Talents. Are we using them for God's purposes and commandments?
In the ten commandments some of the 'Thou Shall Nots' are: Lie, Covet, Steal & Murder. How should we be judged on our wars with Afghanistan & Iraq? We lied about who perpetrated the 9/11 murders (if you have not researched the 9/11 treason that took place, you owe to your country to do so) and we lied about Iraq having weapons of mass destruction.
Why would we do such a thing? We covet the oil in Iraq and the poppies in Afghanistan (if you have not researched the number one terrorist organization in history, the CIA, you owe it to your country to do so. Along with hired militias ,e.g., Blackwater they recklessly torture and kill at will. And in order to finance their Black Ops, they are the world's number one drug dealers, relying on Afghanistan as the number one provider of heroin in the world.)
We now are stealing the oil & gas in Iraq and the Caspian Sea region and lining the pockets of Cheney's Haliburton and Poppy Bush's Carlyle Group.
And worst of all we are mass murdering the people of these regions, just because they happened to be born in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Lying, Coveting, Stealing & Murdering -- I cannot see where our judgement can be anything but the harshest. The parable of the Talents says that those who are blessed, have a heavy responsibility. Are you working to take on this responsibility or are you burying your Talents in the ground?
Oh BTW, what has our intervention in Iraq done to their Quality of Living Index? They are now ranked #195 out of 195 countries.
"Health is a halo worn by the unaware" and another way to keep our young daughters healthy and aware of having good health is to have them immunized with Gardasil -the only know preventative for 3 of the most common strains of cervical cancer.
One of my closest, most conservative Christian friends was highly opposed to this vaccine because she felt, as many in Texas do, that this vaccine would somehow endorse promiscuity. Then I shared with her some of the cold, hard facts of life.
1) every 20 minutes someone is sexually assaulted in the United States
2) of those sexually assaulted, 80% are under the age of 18
3) 60% of all married men admit that they have committed adultery in their marriage.
A young women who leads a moral, monogamous marital relationship is, sadly, still in danger of contracting cervical cancer because of these hard facts.
Would you want your daughter to be victimized twice through no fault of her own?
My friend's daughter has received the vaccine and so have my 2 daughters. I want all young girls to be "ONE LESS."
~ Leeanne
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