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THE STARFISH STORY

While walking along a beach, an elderly man saw a young boy in the distance who was picking up starfish off the sand and gently tossing them back into the ocean.

As he neared the boy, the man smiled and said, “Why are you throwing starfish back into the water?”

The boy replied, “The sun is up, and the tide is going out; if I don’t throw them back in, they’ll die.”

The man commented, “But, son, don’t you realize that many, many starfish have washed up along every mile of this beach? You can’t possibly make a difference!”

The boy listened politely. He then bent down, gently picked up another starfish, and tossed it past the breaking waves.

“Sir,” he replied, “I made a difference to that one.”

Adapted from “The Star Thrower” by Loren C. Eiseley

The starfish was adopted as the emblem of One Man’s Treasure because, like the young boy on the beach, we make a difference in the lives of the men we serve, one by one.

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