“Jesus was left behind.”

 

“Make sure Jesus is traveling with you.”

 

The best way to neglect priorities is by focusing on the routine. Routine makes you take for granted that which is most important.

 

Traveling with everybody, like everybody else, with the same predisposition of everybody else focusing on arrival and not in the fellowship of the one with whom you are traveling is a common mistake.

 

Godly men of old would say in solemn resolution, “Unless your presence goes with us, we shall not go.” Unless “Emanuel” is with me from the rising of the sun to the going down of the same, and every hour in between why should I care for any journey long or short?

 

Joseph and Mary were paid handsomely by God himself to babysit his little boy Jesus. God used three wise men from the East to bring gifts for his son such as incense, myrrh and gold. It is hard for me to imagine that one of the kings could have brought couple little coins but a chest full of gold coins. A wealthy king would not go personally to worship God traveling thousands of miles taking couple gold coins as a gift to the King of Kings.

 

Joseph and Mary were ordained ministers to live for the Gospel and live by the Gospel. As every ministry from God they were set free from worldly cares as they care for Jesus. Their job description was to babysit one boy who after a routine of twelve years they failed. Jesus was left behind in Jerusalem after the feast of the Passover.

 

Another common mistake of the religious. Making room for Jesus in the heart is more important than just to accommodate Jesus as one more thing in our life. It is one thing to tolerate Jesus and a whole different story to celebrate Jesus. Sooner or later the difference is evident.

 

Just as dead flies give bad odor to the perfume of the perfumist, so is a small folly to a man esteemed as wise. In the last three weeks I have met many men and women in the hospital. Being flat on my back but with wide open eyes has revealed to me things of the human nature I did not noticed before.

 

Based on my observations the only exercise I could do was to jump to this conclusion and the following is a taste of that:

There are those who live life under “The Royal Law” as stated in the book of James. They are to me Royalty. Then there are those heroes and the cowards and the possessed. The royalties are those who are highly motivated by the love of God that constrains them and they do things right and joyfully even if there seem to be nothing in it for them. Thus they show the kind of a spirit that governs their lives and it is highly encouraging to see them in action in the name of Jesus and displaying family resemblance with our Lord.

 

Then there are the heroes, who are like the Good Samaritan they see themselves in the suffering of others and full of compassion they discharge their duties of service with joy and have their Hippocratic oath of “Doing no harm” not only on their heads but in their hearts Of such a hero was a beautiful young nurse whose name I want to honor Sarah Maldof of the third floor of the Erlanger Hospital in the Miller Eye Center. In the same breath I want to mention Jacob of Philippine American heritage a rehab Prince in Erlanger who helped me to walk my first steps as I relearn to walk again.

 

The third group of people are the “cowards” who are there because of the job but not because of the vocation to serve. These people had a body language toward the patient loaded with attitude. He would come after several call of the red button and literally towering over my bed he would say, “what do you want bud”?  “I need to go to the rest room.” These are you choices “buddy”, either I help you to walk to the toilet or you do it on a potty next to you bed or I will place a container under you in the bed.

I choose the potty next to my bed. Then you will have to wait because we do not have one at the present time.

 

How long will it take? I asked. “This afternoon or tomorrow morning.”

But I need it now!

 

Those are your choices “Bud”. My name is Gerry not “Bud”. (Big mistake).

His Irish temperament got the best of him and he walked away to see him no more. The next thing I know was a tall nurse walking in as a mother hen or hit woman to put me in my place. And that she did very efficiently and after that she left me in the hands of “petit” Sarah Maldof my hero, who took good care of me as my mother did seventy years ago. The same day I was kicked out to another building to an smaller room in some seventh floor.

 

Now to my definition of cowards, “a coward is he or she who has advantage over you and knows it and still choses to fight you knowing that he or she will win and there is nothing you can do to defend yourself.”

I hate to find dead flies in the perfume of the perfumist, because it gives bad odor to their perfume. In the same way I find no pleasure in the folly of a man or woman whom I esteem as wise.

●  I found some of those even among those highly educated who at the end show their claws behind their otherwise soft paws.

●  The possessed are not worth mentioning in detail because they are those    souls from the dark world who are happy only when they make others unhappy and attract the elect for any reason or no reason at all but hate because you belong to Jesus.

Though I have been silent since I left the hospital it’s time to come back to the spirit of Christmas and speak to your heart to think thoughts of our Lord Jesus who found no room in the inn for him.

 

How could God the Lord of the universe make himself a small fragile little boy to be born in a manger in a winter night so long ago and leave generations wondering in the mystery of the Incarnation? What was the greater miracle? God dwelling in the body of a little boy or a little boy from no where becoming the servant of the Most High God and make in Jesus coheir of life and life eternal?

 

I shall not seek to understand this miracle of miracles but I will just receive it afresh and enjoyed it this Christmas along with you in a childlike manner.

I will hang out my big stocking at the fireplace and expect an iPad because my iPhone is becoming too small to type my letters to you with one finger.

Apart from my clothing, only my iPhone goes with me everywhere.

I also need a night table, a dresser and a “small” desk. I know these things cannot fit in my stocking so deliver it at the door please.

 

Nathaniel thinks that I would enjoy a noise cancelling “Bose” earphones that play wireless music of my choice in blue tooth. That can surely be stuffed in the wide mouth red stocking marked “G” by the chimney in Lois’s house in Arcadia, CA just few blocks from where I will sit in my wheelchair watching the Rose Parade in Pasadena next to the Governor or the Mayor of the City.

 

Still a wounded warrior in rehab.

 

Merry Christmas my friends.

Gerry Gutierrez.