7 POUNDS

I had not thought I would ever use this space to review a movie and yet, here I am.

Tonight my daughter Olivia and I went to see "7 POUNDS" with Will Smith. I have not in recent memory watched a movie so difficult to get a handle on for so long in - and then once you did - found it so emotionally moving.

I won't give it away, but remember the phrase, 'a pound of flesh?' It means, 'something which is owed that is ruthlessly required to be paid back.' The phrase is derived from Shakespeare's 'Merchant of Venice' and it comes at the insistence of the character Shylock about the payment of Antonio's flesh as the central plot of the play.

SHYLOCK says: "The pound of flesh which I demand of him is dearly bought, 'tis mine and I will have it."

During '7 POUNDS,' Will Smith says to one of the characters: 'You are a good man. You are even a good man when no one is watching.'

How I want that to be able to be said of me ... when no one is looking ... good man. But we have a tendency to want to extract our pound of flesh from those who have hurt us and sometimes we are ruthless about demanding it.

But what if we could turn that around the opposite direction, much like the motivation of the movie? What if we endeavored to give ourselves away in such a manner that - every day - we were looking to find ways to 'give away a pound of our own flesh' for someone who needed it ... someone who needed us. How would it change the world in which we move and live? How would it change our family? How would it change our neighborhood? Our workplace? Our church? How would it change us?

I just wonder.

And be blessed.