"The Pelicano"

The Pelicano is a rusty, old, 466 foot freighter. Yes, she was seaworthy but definitely unwanted. Her list of rejections are noteworthy; New Jersey, Georgia, Bermuda, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, the Antilles, Honduras, the Netherlands, Indonesia and Sri Lanka. Why all the rejections? What’s with this unwanted ship?

The Pelicano was loaded with fifteen thousand tons, or twenty eight million pounds, of Philadelphia’s trash from the summer of 1986. The sanitation workers went on strike. Philadelphia’s waste was burned and the refuse was dumped into the ships’ four holds. Nobody wanted that cargo! Too toxic.  Too old. Too much. At last report, somewhere near Singapore, the ash was dumped into the Indian Ocean. Remember the Pelicano – the world’s unwanted ship.

Unwanted! We have all felt that from neighbors, coworkers, teachers, team members, friends, and even family. Life has a way of dumping toxic stuff on us. Loads of anger, bitterness, bigotry, deceit, guilt, jealousy, and hate, all dumped on us. That stuff contaminates our self-esteem and all of our relationships. Remember, trash ultimately stinks! Others will smell it!

The moral?  Don’t let that trash pile up. The Apostle Paul wrote to the Christians in Corinth and said,

“Love never gives up.

Love cares more for others than for self.

Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have.

Love doesn’t strut,

Doesn’t have a swelled head,

Doesn’t force itself on others,

Isn’t always “me first,”

Doesn’t fly off the handle,

Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others,

Doesn’t revel when others grovel,

Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,

Puts up with anything,

Trusts God always,

Always looks for the best,

Never looks back,

But keeps going to the end.”

  

1 Corinthians 13, The Message

Blessings,