What
we did not learn first, we will learn last for sure.
The
Value of humiliation.
In India there is a snake that particularly kills by striking from
the branch of trees to an unsuspecting passerby.
One day near noon Oliver, a 12-year-old missionary kid, was under a tree
playing when his father screamed at him and said, “Oliver, duck-down and come
to me immediately.”
So that is what Oliver did. He was used to obeying his father. From twenty feet
away he and his father saw the snake that was so close to striking but it missed
him due to his obedience. Jesus said, “The reason why my father loves me is
that I obey his commandments.” Obedience has an ingredient that is called
humility. This is a letter to highlight the value of humiliation.
Life is designed to cope with temptation. The snake will be at a striking distance
and the only antidote or vaccine is obedience. The advice to Eve to not to talk
to strangers came to memory a little too late. When you hear voices other than
that of God’s, you will strangely come to listen to the voice of the serpent
who even in God’s garden is at the striking distance.
Just as Faith comes by hearing and hearing comes from the word of God, in the
same way unbelief comes by hearing and hearing the words of an enemy of God
which is the serpent.
Jesus, the second Adam was tempted by the Devil in the desert three times. Thy
words which I have hidden in my heart have kept me away from temptation.
One must study the word with the intention to obey in complete humility and
childlike dependence. “Duck-down and come to me immediately.”
Adam and Eve fell because they ate. Jesus did not fall because he did not eat.
Jesus has a food that the world does not know. Jesus knew how to live from
every word that comes out of the mouth of God.
As a sick man, victim of the snake bite, I can freely say, beware of the
“SSSnake” bite of the triple head “SSSnake” of Sweets, Salt and Sex. Sweets
will eventually bite you in diabetics and other related problems associated
with craving for sweets. Salt will eventually bite you in High Blood pressure,
heart disease and water retention and kidney failure. Sex will eventually bring
your youthful Indiscretions so that you will pay the rest of your life the debt
accumulated by your lack of obedience and humility.
Once my doctor found out that I had hypertension and diabetes, he bluntly told
me, “If it tastes good, it is not good for you. Sugar and Salt are your
enemies”.
Sex? What about Sex? I should say, “it is not for you to know.”
But since this is a “PG” letter I will attempt to answer by just mentioning
that after so many great kids and fifteen grandchildren and few great
grandchildren, I have done my part of multiplying and filling the earth.
That, which all my life I called mistake, mistake and mistake, has become the
preamble of my present life so that I need so much Humility and humiliation. If
anyone thinks he is helping God by humiliating me more, know that you are
already beating a dead horse.
Nobody digests humility easily, but once you do, it is so good because it keeps
you away from the reach of the serpents’ bite. “Duck-down.”
The beauty of it all is that our Lord and Savior died for me when I was yet a
sinner. This I know and testify because once I was a bad little boy and he
already loved me then. He loves me now and his “Intimacy is greater than my
soul can understand but painfully I rejoice and enjoy.”
Loveable Gerry.
PS. My two eyes.
