GRATITUDE FOR GODLY PARENTS
In all of our lives, it is absolutely certain that no
one has greater import and impact than those whom the Almighty has purposefully
chosen to steward and sustain our lives.
Therefore, we are eternally grateful for the love, guidance and
discipline-seeds that parents have sown so generously in us. Surely, we shall never forget. With your indulgence, I would pay special
homage to my own, Bishop Joseph Edison Bass, Sr. and Mrs. Mary Velma Watts Bass,
parents par excellence.
It brings to mind the observation of a musical
impresario by the name of Sol Hurok, who deeply admired the celebrated African-American
soloist, Marian Anderson. In Hurok’s
words, “Marian Anderson hadn’t simply grown great, she’d grown great simply.” He wrote, “a few years ago a reporter asked Marian
to name the greatest moment in her life. I was quite curious to hear her answer,
knowing she had so many great moments to choose from. There was the night Toscanini remarked that
hers was the finest voice of the century. There was the private concert she gave at the
White House for the Roosevelts and the King and Queen of England. To top it all, there was that Easter Sunday in
Washington when she stood at the Lincoln Monument and sang for a crowd of
75,000 – including the president’s cabinet, supreme court justices, and most
members of congress. Which of those big
moments did she choose? None of them,” concluded
Hurok. “Miss Anderson told the reporter
that the greatest moment of her life was the day she went home and told her
mother she wouldn’t have to wash other people’s laundry for income anymore!”
Gratitude is reflected not only in our attitudes, but
in our corresponding actions. How often I
have wished that my own parents were still alive. I am confident that you, too, are grateful
for yours.
Sisters and brothers, be continually blessed, and
please (above all else) MAKE SURE YOU ARE READY TO MEET OUR SOON COMING KING.
Maranatha!
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