Very often people with a bad past change, but do we give them a second chance?
Listen to the story of former Mayor Anthony Williams. He was born to an unwed teen who gave him up for adoption. He was known as a "problem child" in foster care. By age three, little Anthony had still never spoken a word. It seemed that a pattern for his life was set, that is, until two warm and caring people took a chance on him.
Anthony was taken in by an opera-singing postal clerk and her equally generous-hearted husband. He soon began to speak and eventually thrived in their home. He excelled academically and later attended both Harvard and Yale Universities.
In 1998, he came from obscurity to win 66% of the vote to become mayor in one of the world's major cities. In his inaugural address, Williams said: "Forty-four years ago, my parents adopted me and gave me a second chance. I feel this city has now adopted me and I will give to it everything my parents taught me about love, service, commitment."
It's no doubt that, had he never been adopted into his particular family, his life would have been wholly different. He was saved by a second chance. Haven't each of us been given second chances? Second chances in relationships, jobs and opportunities?
There’s this other story of a young American woman who was saved by being given a second chance. During the second World War, she lost her husband. and she became despondent. In time, despair turned into depression and she lost all interest in living. e.
She booked passage on a ship back to America. On the voyage, she became acquainted with a seven-year-old boy who, like her, was all alone. His parents had died in the fighting in Burma. He seemed to want to be with the young woman, but her pain would not allow it. She wanted nothing to do with him and avoided him whenever possible.
Then one night the ship was torpedoed. The young woman made her way to the deck. The child, too, came on deck. When he spotted the woman, he came over and clung to her. She put her arms around the child and led him to one of the lifeboats. For several days, as they waited to be rescued, she held him and he held her. Years later her friends would say that they didn't know whether the woman saved the boy, or the boy saved the woman. They each gave the other a second chance at life and love.
What about you? Would you like to look around and see whether there are people who need a second chance? Maybe in doing so, you will also give yourself a second chance to live and love..!
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