In the past I have shared information about good stories that don't make it into the newspaper because people are too modest and don't want their good works broadcast to the world. Lots of people like to talk about how much corruption and dishonesty there is in our society, perhaps because the best stories are never told.
I had it happen again this week with a potential story about forgiveness.
More than a week ago, I ducked into a courtroom to listen in on a sentencing hearing for a young man charged with negligent homicide. It turns out he had graduated from high school less than one year ago. His charged came about after he was involved in a car accident where the evidence clearly showed he was at fault. He readily admitted it, too.
The young man got a call from a family member notifying him that his sister had been involved in a car accident and was being transported to a hospital. The man jumped in his car and sped off to his mother's home to meet her and go with her to the hospital. In his haste, he passed a car in a no passing zone and ended up striking a motorcycle rider, who later died because of his injuries.
After listening to the judge hand down a very light sentence of 10 years probation, I looked in the court file and discovered that the parents of the motorcyclist asked the judge to be merciful to the young man, to give him perhaps a week in jail, so that the young man would not have his life ruined.
I wanted to interview this modest, unassuming couple to tell their story about how they had the strength during a period of immense grief to forgive the man who caused it. So far my request has been met only with silence (this is at least the third time I have been rebuffed on such stories).
The next time someone talks about how pervasive wickedness and evil are in the world, I'm going to pause and think back to this quiet couple who exhibited charity through their actions.
Sure, there is much wickedness. It is often bragged and joked about. Sometimes it can be thrust in your face.
But charity suffereth long, is kind, vounteth not itself and is not puffed up. It is the pure love of Christ, and I've noticed it is alive and well in a lot of unassuming, good-hearted people from all walks of life.
It's just that their stories hardly ever get told.
Friday, January 23, 2009
The best stories are never told
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
Over the years I have grown more cynical as I have learned more of the truth of history and what really happens around us every day. I realize that many of the things reported in the newspapers and on TV are sensational. The stories that are chosen are sensational because that is what the old deceiver wants. By the same token, there is much that is not reported in the media.
Ron Brown, the Secretary of Commerce, from a recent administration was apparently murdered, along with people that could have been witnesses.
Vince Foster committed suicide in a fashion that was not physically probable.
Men were lined up to see the effects of nuclear blasts.
Area 51 was incinerating toxic waste and harming people that worked at the facility, but no story.
Experiments per performed on mental patients along the lines of sterilization and psychological studies, including lobotomies.
People were expelled from their homes by a President against Supreme Court rulings that Native Americans were autonomous and the Federal Government had no jurisdiction.
The list could go on.
I do not deny that there is good done that is not noted or publicized, but I believe there are much worse things that people hide in their closets and the media stays away out of fear or ignorance.
Post a Comment