CHAPLAIN’S WORD
“WHAT ARE SOME OF THE INGREDIENTS OF ACHIEVEMENT THAT EVERY BROTHER NEEDS FROM ANOTHER?”
people are dying of star- vation and dehydration in Samaria. These four lepers, because they are contagious and deemed unclean are living in quarantine outside the city, according to the religious laws of Leviticus 13 and Numbers 5. They aren’t the only one though, conservatively there are about 1,000 people in their same condition but there is something special that binds these four that makes them different, something that helps them not only survive but also prosper and achieve as they made the bold decision to search for life by going to the Assyrian camp. Everyone with leprosy is in quarantine and content to die there, except these four. They believe that they deserve something better and refuse to die just sitting there. That’s what I need in my life, brothers who refuse to let me sit in a dying place. We all need brothers in this Bond who remind us that we were created for more
than mediocrity and sitting in places of anonymity and unproductivity. We must be the ones who continue to believe in one another and encourage each other to keep pursuing and pressing and pushing our way into greater. These four refused to allow what the others thought was normal to become acceptable for them. That’s what we need and require of each other as brothers, a reminder that the limitations of others never sets the standard for us. We all need brothers who encourage us to dream outside the box and pursue the unprecedented because “eyes have not seen, nor have ears heard, the good things that God has in store for us” (I Corinthians 2:9). What I like most about these four was their ability to be honest with each other about the tough reality of where they were – in a place where there was no future for them. Here’s where we can benefit each other as brothers in ways
others cannot, being honest with one another about the realities of where we are and what we’re doing. We all need brothers, who we trust, that can tell us when we’re in danger, where we’re messing up, when we need to do better, where we’ve dropped the ball, when we’re wrong and need to make corrections. The real test of brotherhood is not if you’ll cover me when I’m wrong but will you challenge me to get right? I need brothers who believe in me so much that they’ll hold me accountable to my potential and never let me easily abort my possibility. These four lepers who believed they deserved better, and refused to settle like others, and were honest with each other, made the bold move of going to the enemy’s camp to find food. And they moved at dusk. Dusk is that time when the sun is going down or right before it comes up. At dusk things aren’t as clear as you’d like them to be. At dusk you
can’t see all the way up the road, you can only see one step at a time. Brothers, as much as we’d like clarity and certainty in all that we do, there comes a time when you have to move at dusk. Times when we don’t know how it will all work out, times when we can’t see beyond the next step, times when uncertainty may outweigh assurance. That’s when our brother- hood becomes the most critical – to know that there are brothers who won’t let us fall, brothers who won’t let us travel alone, brothers who remind us of what these four faithfully found out, when you make a move God will make a way. May these be the ties that bind us through Phi Nu Pi to our fundamental pur- pose as brothers and men created in the image of the Almighty. Amen. ♦ Reverend Dr. Howard-John Wesley (Iota Xi 1991) serves as the National Chaplain for the 35th Administration.
FALL 2023 ♦ THE JOURNAL 11
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