Do No Harm
Do No Harm
When I worked at the hospital as a RN, I would pray everyday prior to going out on the floor to work. The prayer I prayed was this: “Lord, help me to do no harm”. I knew I was only a human and could very easily make a mistake that could cause problems in my patient’s life. I wanted to cover them and myself from such trouble.
Applying Doing No Harm to Our Christian Walk
What if we as followers of Christ (teachers, pastors, apostles, prophets, evangelists, everyone) prayed this prayer every morning as our feet hit the floor before starting our day. “Doing no harm” is not about patting someone on their back saying “You are going to be okay” just to make another person to feel better in the midst of their sin. It is not about making an exception to God’s commandments/laws just to make someone feel better about themselves because their particular situation was or is a difficult one. “Doing no harm” is standing on the Word of God and loving others as God loves them. We have to do both, standing on the Word and loving as God loves, neither can stand alone because God’s love is reflected in His Word.
We Have Became Too Much Like the World
The world’s ideas has infiltrated the church and the “Christian” life way too much. We are more concern about how our words or actions affects a person emotionally than we are how they will affect them spiritually. The life we live here on earth is a mere microscopic speck compared the life we will live out throughout eternity. We as a church have become way too carnal in our thinking. We have made decisions based on the flesh (our emotions) not by the leading of the Spirit. We have become more concerned with satisfying the flesh than the glorifying an all powerful God. We have led lives that have deceived others in to believing a loving God would never send a person to hell for their sins of commission or omission. In reality, most “Christians” today do not know what the Bible says, they depend on what they hear and see from the church pulpits on Sunday morning or what they see in the media, many of which are watered down versions of the truth that are found between the covers of the Holy Bible. Many times these messages that are shared have little resemblance to the real truth of God. It is time to be real and begin to live authentic lives that reflect the life that Christ lived out in the gospels of the New Testament.
Prayer Changes Things
Let us all begin to pray this prayer, “Lord help me to do no harm today” every morning of our lives, knowing that the way we live and the things we say can and will make a difference in the lives of those that come in our paths every day. Our lives, our words may have a fatal impact or may have a positive impact in another’s life. The Bible puts this way in Matthew 12:35-37, “The good person out of his good treasure brings forth good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure brings forth evil. I tell you, on the day of judgment people will give account for every careless word they speak, for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.”
Be Blessed,
Terry
