Draw Near – 365 Guides to Greater Intimacy with GodSample

NAMES, NOT NUMBERS During the last census, a man entered a home where there were several children clinging to their mother's skirt. "How many children do you have?" he asked. "Let's see," she said, "There's Elsie, and Mendy, and Jonathan..." At this point the visitor interrupted, "I am not interested in their names, but only in their number." The mother looked him firmly in the eye and replied, "My children have no numbers. They have names!" In our highly impersonal world, we are at times tempted to think we are merely numbers. However, the story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead lets us know His personal care for each of His own (John 11:17-46). We are not mere blobs of protoplasm to our Master, but we are very special in His sight and dear to His heart. Jesus cares. Jesus felt deeply the sorrow of Mary and Martha. He prayed confidently to the Father that He would honor the prayer; then He called forth the dead brother. What a comfort today to realize that although there are millions of people in the world, God is not too busy to care about the individual. Perhaps it would be well to stop a brief moment to thank God because we are more than numbers; we are names.