This is going to completely out me as a small town girl, but the sheer size and the huge number of people who live in LA is… overwhelming. Amazing, too. And humbling. There’s around four million people in the city itself. There’s more than ten million in LA county. And there’s a few million more in Orange County right next door. That’s around seventeen million people, each with their own lives, their own families, their own friends, their own joys, their own sorrows.
And this huge number of people is just a fraction of the population of the whole United States (327,000,000). And that’s just a fraction of the roughly seven billion human beings who inhabit the whole planet.
That’s a lot of neighbors to love. That’s a lot of people who would be affected by anyone trying to make the world a better place. And that’s overwhelming too. But we’re not responsible for the whole world on our own– that burden is on bigger shoulders. We’re “just” responsible for our own actions and the way we treat others*. It’s what God does with that that’s going to change the world.
* Even typing that out, I realize that that’s a distinctly Western/individualistic view. I think it’s true as far as it goes, but there’s more to it that I haven’t figured out how to articulate.
I forgot to check my wordcount before I left the house– so if you happen to be curious, check back later tonight.
F.A. Hakimian 