Religion in Daily Life

 © By the Rev. Edward Chinn, D.Min.

http://www.allsaintstorresdale.org

“The miners said two things helped keep them going-the warm air being pumped down into the part of the mine where they took refuge from the rising waters, and the sound of the drilling as the workers on the surface tried to save them” (ABC News.com, July 29, 2002). These miners in Somerset, PA, were trapped for three days in a flooded shaft 240 feet underground. The rescue efforts were successful. As we read what kept these miners going through their ordeal, it makes us find reasons to keep going in our own daily lives, when we sometimes feel buried in darkness.

One reason you can keep going is that you are a person of value. Only ten miles from the miners’ plight and rescue is Shanksville, PA. It was there last September 11 that the hijacked plane, United Flight 93, crashed in a field. Contrast the disregard and devaluation of human life shown by the terrorists with the respect and regard for human life displayed by the rescue workers. Both Judaism and Christianity value every human being because he or she has been created in God’s image. “Whoever saves one life, it is as if he saved the entire world” (The Talmud).

Another reason you can keep going is that you are important in other persons’ lives. One of the trapped miners, Harry Mayhush, knew that. When the rescue drill fell silent for 18 hours, Harry borrowed a pen to write a final word to his family on a scrap of cardboard. Since the 1920s, Quantum Mechanics has been nudging aside the classical physics of Isaac Newton. Writing about Quantum Mechanics, David Merim of Cornell University says: “The basic elements of physical reality aren’t individual objects, but relationships between individual objects.” Likewise, your life is a web of relationships with other persons to whom you count a great deal.

Still another reason you can keep going is that you are in a game that’s not over yet. Situations change. In his book Please Don’t Shoot the Messenger, Gary S. Goodman tells about talent agents who have to deal with tough Hollywood studio executives. These talent agents receive a lot of abuse. “One successful agent handles it by smiling on the outside while thinking, ‘In this business, everybody moves on. If I can’t deal with you, I’ll deal with your successor.'” As the former New York Yankees catcher Yogi Berra says, “It ain’t over till it’s over.” You can keep going because every problem you face is a temporary problem. Because God will uphold you in life forever, you’ll outlive every problem you face.