Simon and Garfunkle sang a song called “Bridge Over Troubled Waters.” This powerful song still plays itself out in our lives, at least it should. It goes like this: “When you’re weary, feeling small. When tears are in your eyes, I will dry them all. I’m on your side, oh, when times get rough and friends just can’t be found. Like a Bridge over troubled waters I will lay me down.”
WOW! Are you that kind of friend? No matter what? No matter when? You are there to be a bridge, at the side of those who need help. When someone is down and out or on the streets and has no place to live, are you there to comfort, to encourage, to be a refuge in the time of their storm? When darkness falls are you there to bring light? Do you lay yourself down so the one who can not lift themself up will find a friend in the trenches with them? By laying yourself down then the helpless and the hopeless can walk over you to the other side, the side that maybe has been out of reach, because of a canyon too big and too wide to cross over. Are you there to carry that one who is too tired to continue walking? Maybe they are not even someone you know and yet, you see that they need someone to bring hope and comfort and love. When pain fills a person they become weary and even the least amount of effort on their part becomes a valley and that valley becomes a valley of tears, so wide and so deep that they can not cross it. But you are willing to lay your life down and become a bridge for them to cross. I tell you today, we protest and we talk and even shout but that is all it is, nothing but talk. We have to walk the walk. We have to be willing to lend a helping hand to those not only who we agree with but those who we don’t. People are people, they are not a number or a statistic or they may not be on our side or even agree with us. This is not political. This is about being a human being, a good neighbor, a decent person. You don’t ask questions and then determine if they fit the bill. In times of disaster, we in this country have always helped our fellow man. But what about everyday living? How about when the darkness falls upon a person and they need help? If you go to school or you work or maybe neither, maybe you too need someone? There is nothing better for someone to help another person raise up their own spirit. That is how we are made inside. Become a bridge today. I tell you, you don’t have to go far to find someone who needs a friend or a helping hand or even someone who needs you to lay your life down so they can cross over the deep hole that stands before them. This was and still is a powerful song, a song with a powerful meaning, a song that we need today, as there are so many people today going through dark times, times in which they do not know how they will get through. Become a bridge and you will never regret it!