Serving God

Do we choose service?  Or the illusion of service?

Published 12/09/07

Benjamin Franklin wrote that “Serving God is doing good to man, but praying is thought an easier service, and therefore more generally chosen.”

The arguments concerning a national health-care program reminded me of that thought.

Not too many years ago I was one of those who ranted about “socialism” and “transferring wealth from the working to the non-working,” etc.  Having grown and learned a bit over the years, I’ve come to realize that serving others is the HIGHEST form of life.  Everything in nature (except, perhaps, love bugs) serves at least one purpose for some entity other than itself.  To be true to nature, then, I believe we should make serving the people around us our PRIMARY activity, rather than “working hard for our retirement.”

But, in creating national welfare and health programs, are we really “serving others,” or are we simply placing that responsibility on the shoulders of politicians?

Ben Franklin’s thought could thus be altered: “Serving God is doing good to man, but electing someone to do that is thought……”

From what I’ve read of the national health-care systems in Canada, France, and England, they have the same problems we do – the inability to pay for it all.  It seems to me that “national” services, because they are controlled from so far away and run by people who neither pay for them nor benefit from them, are the most inefficient ways to help people.

If there were absolutely no government programs to help people, would we all just watch as our friends and neighbors starved, froze to death, or died painful, lingering deaths due to the inability to pay for care?  I doubt it.  But so long as we enjoy the illusion that someone else will take care of it all, that’s exactly what will continue to happen.