Giving All That We Can – April 25, 1999
In our daily opportunities to give help to others, do we measure our efforts in terms of their immediate results or by whether we did all that we could to serve those around us? Our efforts need not be expensive or well publicized. We can bless the lives of others through seemingly small, well-intentioned acts of generosity and love.
Far too many people go through life doing nothing because they wish they could do more. Commuting on a city bus, a man noticed a destitute woman. Grief and poverty had etched themselves into everything about her. Her many obvious needs seemed to swallow his desire to help her. He stood by, feeling helpless, realizing he could not eliminate her suffering or solve all her problems. As he watched her, a single act of kindness forever changed his perspective. Another passenger, obviously not a wealthy man, quietly placed his worn gloves in the woman’s lap as he exited the bus. It was not all that she needed, but it was the best he could give.1
In seeking to serve others, our focus should be on the simple things that we can do, not on the many things that we can’t. As Edward Everett Hale expressed it:
I am only one,
But still I am one.
I cannot do everything,
But still I can do something.
And because I cannot do everything
I will not refuse to do the something
That I can do.2
Often our days are changed by the smallest acts of kindness. A listening ear, an understanding smile, an expression of appreciation, an offer of assistance?we have all been blessed by others’ thoughtfulness. And while we cannot always move the imposing mountains we see in the lives of others, our willingness to do what we can for them will beautify the landscape of any life.
When we give all we can from a willing heart, we change both ourselves and the world. By offering others the best we have, even in simple ways, we truly give the greatest gift of all.
Program #3636
1 Adapted from John H. Sisley Jr., The Prince of Peace Is Born (pamphlet, 1991), quoted in Chieko Okazaki, Sanctuary (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1997), 77.
2 In John Bartlett, comp., Familiar Quotations, 15th ed. (Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1980), 590.