Valueable

Paul Newman died Friday Sept. 26, 2008. I heard it on the radio news. I was sad. I thought about his wife Joanne Woodward, 50 years of marriage and now she’s without her mate. I thought of no more movies with old blue eyes. I remembered Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, the very first R rated movie I ever saw. I thought of Newman’s Own popcorn and his smiling face on the grocery shelf. The reporter went on for a while recalling Paul Newman’s career and life. He will be missed by many.

The next report on the radio news was the bombing of an embassy. 16 dead. I had just been adjusting to a world without Paul Newman and there are 16 others people missing as well. It gave me pause to think one man had five minutes of world wide air time for his 83 years on earth. Then the next group of 16 had a collective 5 seconds of air time for all their years combined. I am not about to rant about celebrity, for I do feel Paul Newman gets his due. He was a great actor as well as a humble humanitarian. No, the thought that came to mind was we are all important from God’s point of view. Whether the person missing is famous or not God takes note for he loved that child unconditionally.

Listening to those news items back to back made me pause to take a look at how important each human being is. We all matter. We all have an impact. Those 16 missing people in the embassy explosion are lost forever. All the things the did in life are over. The things they would have done, the lives they would have touched will be different now. And the loved ones left behind are forever changed as well. Just as Paul Newman left a grieving family so did each of those 16. God has taken note and welcomes those home to paradise. He’s rejoicing with the ones in heaven and he’s comforting those left on earth.

We can’t live forever, nor would we want to if you really considered the consequences, but it still hurts when a loved one dies. God is aware of all of our lives from the very famous to the ones rolled into collective bunches. We all matter—by name—to God.

Posted 10/9/2008 @ 8:32 AM | Weekly Thoughts