“When you do something for someone else, don’t call attention to yourself. You’ve seen them in action, I’m sure—‘playactors’ I call them—treating prayer meeting and street corner alike as a stage, acting compassionate as long as someone is watching, playing to the crowds. They get applause, true, but that’s all they get. When you help someone out, don’t think about how it looks. Just do it—quietly and unobtrusively. That is the way your God, who conceived you in love, working behind the scenes, helps you out.
Matthew 6:3 – The Message Bible
For as much as we hear about the bad, Memphis has so much good. Her people, personified, and now highlighted by Bill Courtney locally and kindred spirits nationally, care for their neighbor. It’s not for promotion or grandstanding. Often, it’s a need seen and responded to. He calls those bringing light to the darkness “an army of normal folks” because they are housewives, social workers, real estate folks, non-profit leaders, grandparents, teachers, ex-cons, accountants and more. Most will never know their name or the impact that individual made on the world around them.
““Our country’s problems will never be solved by a bunch of fancy people in nice suits talking big words on CNN and Fox, but by An Army of Normal Folks just deciding ‘hey, I can help’” – Bill Courtney, from his website.
Tonight Lord, we lift up the Normal Folks doing good deeds to those around them. We thank you for their patience and persistence. We thank you for their faithfulness. We thank you for their qualities that cannot be measured. And Lord, we pray for more of them. We pray for this Army to find recruits and for the service clubs to be a sense of loving community that helps build, grow, and maintain thriving community.
We confess that we have ignored the marginalized and downtrodden. Lord, we repent. Open our eyes to the needs of the Kingdom and charge our souls with the conviction of the Holy Spirit to be Your Hands and Feet. Bless Mr. Courtney’s work to promote good in this world and inspire others to selflessness. Lord, may our desire to help not be overcome by our temptation to not. Forgive us for those times in the past where our calendar was deemed ours, forgetting that you grant us each day, and that each day has the potential for Holy redemption. Lord, may we not waste the small amount of time we have on this earth only on ourselves, but by finding true joy through loving our neighbor. In Christ’s name, Amen.
https://wreg.com/on-air/live-at-9/army-of-normal-folks-shines-a-light-on-whats-right-in-memphis