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STRANGERS

June 7, 2012
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For me, there are no my people and strangers, no bad people and good people. All people are equal for me.
Viktor Yanukovych

This statement by the Ukrainian Statesman and President is the summary of this conviction I share with you in this post. The theme of strangers came to me after my experience with three different people I was very well meaning towards but because they considered me a stranger, they will not connect and thus lost the opportunity to connect to a new person. It equally reminds me of the many people I have considered strangers and have therefore lost the opportunity as it were to connect with them.

Being in the corporate world now, I fully understand what social acquaintances are really worth. The value of teams and customer service can never be over-emphasized. I write this in perspective of love for humanity and personal branding.

I am pretty familiar with the childhood advice of ‘Do not talk to strangers’ because I received it quiet often. I know such upbringings have definitely had a tone on our welcoming of strangers. I do not seek to advocate for a whole sing along open all doors policy, I only write on the lines of prudence and good judgment.

Good sense will basically teach that, all the relations a person has, even of the closest ones, such were ones strangers. I know some people who are reading at this point are switching in their defenses, just before you do so fully allow me to tell you a story:

A lawyer ones asked a wise man, what it will take for somebody to be judged as righteous, innocent and worthy of praise. The wise man pointed the lawyer to the basic intent of all laws, to deal lovingly with ones neighbour. The lawyer pushing the bounds asked who then a man’s neighbour was.

The wise man told a story of a man travelling from a far city who suddenly met a group of thieves. The thieves took everything he had and beat him and left him lying half dead in the middle of the street. The man in his desperate need for help heard footsteps and thanked God for sending help because the man was dressed as a priest. Unfortunately for him, his groaning did not touch the heart of the priest enough because he was so much in the ‘Spirit’ going to minister.

Similarly came near him one who obviously was a servant in the godly courts. The wounded man faintly screamed for attention, moaning on the ground, at least deserving of pity. But the Levite could only think of the offering he had to render at the altar, so he left the man to die in order to make time for service. The half dying man, in so much pain of both rejection and physical hurts,  gave up all hopes of ever been helped and thus retired faith, waiting for dead to cease him.

He then heard a touch on his body, struggled to open his fading eye only to see a Samaritan, one he didn’t even like neither was he liked by him. Reasoning with himself among two options, either this Samaritan is sent by death to finally end his pain and misery or he is an angel from God. But he wondered if God would send such a stranger as an angel.

The long and short of the story is that, the Samaritan helps the dying man, takes him to the hospital, pays the bills, feeds him and gives him allowance for contingencies. All an act from a stranger!

At this point Jesus, who told the original story, asked the lawyer who a man’s neighbour was, the Priest, the Levite or the Samaritan? This story has gone down history isle to be called The Story of the Good Samaritan. I just told my paraphrased version but the essence for me is that, the seemingly godly people were the most culpable of the stranger’s phobia and therefore treated him as such because he was not their neighbours.

The next time you are tempted to write off a stranger, think of him/her among two things, he/she is either in dire need of help and looking onto you as the angel sent by God or the stranger you are rejecting is the solution and the addition that will jazz up your life unto purpose.

For those who will reason among rational lines of what if the stranger is not good enough for you, or what if they come in to hurt you or things like that, I honestly may not have an answer for you but to wish you well and pray that you are guided by prudence in all your choices to strangers, but remember ‘Never distrust a person until he/she has given you enough reason to do so’, for Abram received angel into his house without knowing. I guess he was only been calmly with strangers.

May we all treat each other with the respect and love we desire and most certainly deserve, Love and relationship are universal quest and need because we all are supposed to be the universal solution to loving and relating!

TO OUR COMMON HUMANITY- CHEERS
Yaw Sompa

Author Yaw Sompa

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