Moments of Greatness - Moments of Tragedy

Before this week I never heard the name Jordan Manners. Few people at his school last year, in his Grade Eight Class, would look at him as being unusual. After all he was a Grade Eight student… just barely beginning. Yet today a national newspaper blares a headline of “Sorrow and Anger” from its front page. Jordan Manners’ life was taken two days ago by another young person in a school stairway – by one ugly shot from a gun. He went from a moment of being a likeable teenager to a national figure. It happened in mere moments. A series of bad moments collected to change a world.

I have been thinking of the other young person that pulled the trigger. One ugly moment that has now changed his or her world forever. One really stupid decision that cannot be reversed and can never be taken back – has left this person in a world that will always be filled with nightmares. This moment of tragedy – took just a split second to transform a whole world.

How do I know this?

In my ministry, over the course of years of my working with a broken world, I have met two men, in different places, that have done the unthinkable thing of killing another person. These men stand out as being on their own – horribly unique in their own way. I have met with other men that have killed people – but these two were very different. They had never been caught for what they had done. At least the accounts that they shared in their broken conditions indicated terrible things had happened and they were never free of the nightmare. That is why they talked with me to try to find relief.

I have thought of these men often – wondering where they are now. I have many doubts that either is alive today. In the last two days these memories have come alive in me again – as I think of a young person that pulled a trigger and changed a family’s life forever – and shattered his own.

Moments can be filled with decisions that lead to Greatness or to Tragedy. It is a unique and simple decision that someone makes that will change everything – for everyone. The sad part is that – only the tragic decision moments get national headlines.

Keith’s Life…
In the course of my ministry I served in Scarborough as a youth pastor as few years back. In this role my life was entwined with little guys like Jordan Manners. I remember most of them. They come from struggling homes with one parent usually. They love music and friends. They collect wherever the action is taking place. But for myself as ‘white pastor’ there were limits to what I would know and understand. I came from the very different world of southern Saskatchewan where I attended school when I was their age.

It was at that stage a person by the name of Keith stepped into my life. Keith was black. He and his wife came to talk to me about doing something with the teens in the community that we ministered in. Volunteers that were burdened and ready to get involved – wow!

Keith was a mechanic that worked for a very large company. He loved his job and did well in it. He was young and ready. He was muscular and sturdy. Keith and his wife had a young family and wanted to get involved.

Keith described the moment that changed his own life. In high school, in the Scarborough area, his fellow students were not doing well. There were fights and there were guns. Someone had been knifed and left to die. It was at that moment that Keith took a step into Greatness.

Keith realized that his fellow students struggled with the schooling. They just couldn’t keep up to the level of education that was offered. Keith himself was an excellent student and had very high marks. Keith made a commitment that he would personally tutor any and all students in his school year – so that they would all graduate with him. He talked to other students that did well in their schooling. Together they formed a team that tutored others. In his final year he did hundreds of hours of personal, hand to hand helping with his friends to make sure they passed out of school with their graduation certificates.

Keith and his wife did the same with the teenagers in our youth group. Unpaid and happy their decision to change their own small world made a huge difference to hundreds of teens.

It was in that one small moment that Keith had decided to take Greatness into his life.

Recently I met a young black man that looked at me and said loudly, “You are Murray Lincoln – aren’t you!?” He was handsome and vibrant looking. He told me that he was now a pastor at a church in the Toronto area. He then stated, “You don’t remember me I bet. I was in the Junior High Group when you were a Youth Pastor in Scarborough.” This young man stated, “I remember you.”

Here in front of me was a little boy that was Jordan Manners’ age when he came into our youth group. Keith had taken him on as one of his boys at the youth group and made a commitment to get this one on track – making good decisions. He was a product of Keith’s dream to help people.

Another moment of Greatness that had changed a life entirely – Keith had made a difference.

Today my life is filled with opportunities for Greatness or for the other stuff. I am making choices that will change the world around me. Moments that matter. Moments that will make a difference. What will I do with them?

My new commitment for my 63 rd year is to be available for as many of these Great Moments as possible. If I string them all together there are some Great Possibilities in Great Moments.

How about you? What will you do with your Great Moment opportunities today?

~ Pastor Murray Lincoln ~

To the Family and Friends of Jordan - we are praying for you folks today. It is a terrible time for you we know. Somehow a miracle will come from this to touch many lives.