Neighbors

In Luke chapter 10 a Lawyer asks Jesus what he can do to have eternal life. Jesus asks him how he interprets the law and the Lawyer says:

Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy ^aheart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbour as thyself. 

This past weekend I saw this teaching in action. The street I live on is a great example of what being loving neighbors means. We do not all share the same faith, yet we all share this teaching.

On Friday it was found that I have a Tibia Plateau Fracture. I was fitted with a brace and crutches. On returning home one of our neighbors was walking his dog and asked how I was. Without even hesitating he offered his assistance wherever he could help. Little did I know that the help would be needed so soon.

On Saturday my wife left to go to a canning workshop leaving me with the kids. No big deal, she would be gone for a couple of hours what could happen right? Well if you know my kids anything could happen and did. My oldest son was chasing my 2nd oldest daughter when she fell head first into the bench of our dining table. You guessed it, she gashed her head open. Now I'm hobbled but when the adrenaline flows you can do amazing things. I got to her fairly quickly and over to the sink in order to staunch the bleeding. I tried calling Cheryl with no success. My oldest ran outside and got one of the neighbors to come over.

There was a hole in my daughter's head. Needless to say it was freaky. 911 was called and paramedics came over to take a look. They agreed that she would just need stitches. I told them I would take her to the Urgent Care to get this done. This is where the neighbors come in.

The neighbor who came over offered to drive us to the Urgent Care. Another neighbor took the two boys over to his house so they could play. A third took my oldest daughter who has skating lessons with their daughter. The wife of the neighbor driving us took our youngest daughter with her. No complaints, no hesitation, just good people doing good things. I had no reservations about leaving my children with them. We trust each other implicitly.

We get to the Urgent Care and the neighbor who drove us stayed until Cheryl could come and take us home.

We are very grateful to have the neighbors we do and to have the good relationships with them. It's not only in an emergency that this happens on our street. Every day there are examples of being a good neighbor and living the teachings found in Luke above.