Maybe you’ve experienced this: You’re sitting on the plane, buckled in, waiting for it finally to take off. Suddenly, those little screens come down from the ceiling, and then someone explains the safety measures in case of an emergency. Whenever I heard the emphatic instructions to put your oxygen mask on first before helping someone else, I cringed.
Then on a recent flight, just before they talked about the oxygen mask, the command from the Bible to love your neighbor as yourself (see Leviticus 19:18 and Matthew 19:19) came to my thought. I suddenly realized that up to then I had always seen these verses as a command to help my neighbor first. I had always thought that my neighbor came first, not me. Anything else would not be an expression of love! Or would it?
I remembered a health issue that I had dealt with some time ago. I had been very busy with my job and had not been paying attention to my own needs, or to how I was thinking. I felt weak and had bad headaches. During this turbulent time, everything concerning my neighbor had priority. My daily prayer was focused more on the daily activities that lay ahead of me than on the fact that I was rooted in God. Where were my own safety precautions? As I turned my attention to prayer for my own situation and was reassured that my connection to God was completely intact, I experienced a quick healing. I was able freely and happily to devote myself to my tasks.
