"We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way." - Victor Frank
I read this quote awhile ago and it was so profound that I had to share it. No matter what you are going through it is your choice how you react to it. Will you be better because of it or bitter? Will you become stronger for it or will you give up and blame others? It is all your choice. To think what this man, Victor Frank, had to endure in a concentration camp is just unimaginable to those of us who have never had to go through something like that. Yet we can all learn from his attitude. It is our choice what our attitude will be when we go through the trials of life.
We have a choice to help others or to only think of ourselves. We have a choice to speak words of encouragement or to tear others down. We cannot use the excuse that someone or some circumstance caused us to act or speak a certain way, no that is all up to us. Only us. We are the only ones in control of our words and our actions. So will we reach out in love and compassion as the men that Victor Frank observed did giving away their last piece of bread? Or will we be the ones who are truly in a prison? A prison of our own making. When we have thoughts towards others our world expands but when we have closed in thoughts, only enough love for ourselves and not others, then we make a prison for ourselves.
The men who thought of others needs before their own, were truly free even though they were behind barbed wire. What about you? Do you put others before yourself? Are you truly free and living in a Christ like way or are you locked in a self imposed prison of self centeredness? It's your choice. Choose freedom.
John 8:35 "So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed."
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