“Someone Else” Suddenly Dies
Categories: Church of Christ Bulletin ArticlesThe following article by an unknown author will hopefully motivate us as Christians to think about the importance of doing the Lord’s work both individually and collectively:
The church was saddened to learn this week of the sudden and unexpected death of one of our most active members, Someone Else. In light of how we have depended on him in the past, all of us must reflect carefully on this very sobering news.
Someone Else’s passing creates a vacancy that will be difficult to fill. Else has been with us for many years, and for every one of those years, he did far more than a normal person’s share of the work. Whenever leadership was mentioned, this wonderful person was looked ot for inspiration as well as results. We always thought, “Someone Else will take that responsibility.” Whenever there was a job to do, a class to teach, or a meeting to attend, we always said, “Let Someone Else do it.”
It was common knowledge that Someone Else was among the largest givers in the congregation. Whenever there was a financial need, everyone assumed that Someone Else would increase his giving to take care of it.
Someone Else was a wonderful person, sometimes appearing to be superhuman, but one person can only do so much. Were the truth known, everybody expected too much of Someone Else. Now Someone Else is gone! We wonder what we are going to do. Someone Else left a wonderful example to follow, but who is going to follow it? Who is going to do the things we were always willing to let Someone Else do? Since we can no longer depend on Someone Else to do everything for us, the only way the needs of this congregation will be met is if we each are willing to bear the responsibilities from now on that we once left to Someone Else.
Brethren, let us not be negligent in our responsibility to be fruit bearers (John 15:1-8; cf. Matthew 5:16; Philippians 1:9-11), faithfully laboring in the Lord’s kingdom (Matthew 9:36-38; Luke 10:1-2; John 4:31-38).