Welcome to another Grateful Heart Monday, where each week begins with a piece of gratitude from my life, which for today is for a guy named Ryan, who simply was a good Samaritan during a time of great need.
I truly love the story of the Good Samaritan that Christ talks about in the Gospel of Luke. If somehow you don’t know it, it’s about a traveler who gets stripped of clothing, beaten, and left half dead alongside a road. First a priest and then a Levite walk by, both totally avoiding helping the man whatsoever. But one eventually does help, a Samaritan, who ends up providing the traveler with first aid, shelter, as well as some money for any expenses incurred, such as food or water.
In today’s day and age, being a good Samaritan has become synonymous with anyone who goes out of their way to do a good deed, who also expects nothing in return. Occasionally, I come across stories of people who do this very thing, that might not even see it as being a good Samaritan, as was the case of Ryan.
On an evening very recently, Ryan was heading on a heavily travelled highway home when a massive traffic accident abruptly took place just in front of him. During my years of addictive past, whenever I’d encounter moments like this, I sadly would quickly become that priest or Levite by driving away as fast as I could, not wanting to burden myself. Thankfully, this wasn’t the case for Ryan though, as he immediately stopped and made sure that all oncoming traffic on the highway avoided making the accident scene grow even worse.
Once he got the highway safe and secure from all oncoming vehicles, Ryan then offered to help the police when they arrived by going from car to car to check if everyone was ok, as a good number of vehicles had been involved in the accident. When he came upon the last vehicle, he found a young boy who was frantically screaming out for his father. After initially providing the boy some much-needed words of reassurance, he asked him to stay put while he walked around the vehicle. As he walked around the car, he soon found the body of his father lying motionless in the middle of the highway. Desperately checking for a pulse and finding none, Ryan swiftly returned to the boy and sheltered him from seeing the terrible sight, and in turn continued to offer words of reassurance and unconditional love until more help arrived.
While the story is tragic in of itself, it is the actions of Ryan that I felt truly warranted being written about for this week’s Grateful Heart Monday. Because if there ever was a good example of a Good Samaritan, it’s most definitely in the actions that Ryan demonstrated that fateful evening. I honestly would like to believe nowadays that I would have done the same thing, if I had been in Ryan’s shoes that evening, but I’m extremely grateful to see the Spirit of Christ showed up in Ryan in a true moment of need in this world.
So often, many of us have been that priest or Levite and walked the other way when we could have been of assistance to one of God’s children in serious need, yet thankfully there are some of us who are moved to become that Good Samaritan, people just like Ryan, good people who deserve a lot of praise and plenty to be grateful for…
Peace, love, light, and joy,
Andrew Arthur Dawson
