I bought a little book at a secondhand fair titled The Friendship Book. The author, H.L. Gee, under the pseudonym of Francis Gay, published one every year beginning in 1939. It’s a book about simple deeds of kindness, such as a lady who kept a diary of her adventures so that she would have stories to share when she visited the elderly, an adult who stopped to listen to the story of a child’s day at school, a kind shopkeeper, a selfless public servant.
Viktor Frankl, Holocaust survivor and author of Man’s Search for Meaning, believed that no deed of goodness was ever lost, but rather was stored and treasured in the “granaries of the past” that hold the harvest of our lives.
I believe that not only is kindness never lost, but there are seeds in those “granaries” that when planted result in harvests in the lives of others. For example, suppose you take time to help a little child, and then that child becomes a man who is generous and caring. Maybe he doesn’t remember you or the kind deed you did, but could it be that the attention you gave him as a boy impacted him, so that when he became an adult he was kinder and more attentive to the needs of others? Your kindness was not lost. It was planted and then grew and multiplied.
Back to The Friendship Book. I found a review online written by a young person who also found an old edition in a used book bin. She wrote of the impact that it had on her, how she marked the book and liked to read portions of it to her friends. Imagine, the accounts of thoughtful deeds of people who most likely are no longer on this earth have made a difference in the lives of a young girl and her friends in another century!
When Jesus spoke of the signs of His return in the last days, He said that “the love of many will grow cold” 1. We seem to be living in an age of individualism and indifference. But the Bible also says, in reference to Jesus, that His “light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” 2. And Jesus calls us as well to also be the “light of the world” 3. He is calling each of us to shine His light into the darkness of others’ lives. And even the smallest acts of kindness may have more impact than we will ever know.