I felt so miserable that morning as I dragged myself to the office. I kept wondering when I would hear good news again. My colleagues took note of my forlorn demeanor but shifted their gaze on something else as I looked back and dared not to inquire what the problem was.
I took a break around midday to pray. I normally take a stroll along a favourite path nearby praying under my breath. In actual fact I did not feel like praying but that was all I was left to do. I barely had the strength to weep.
It was quite windy that day as I looked down the cobbled pathway winding down with dead leaves rolling helter-skelter. Kicking imaginary stones along the way I looked up and saw a gentleman whom I knew coming towards me. He greeted me in a shy manner and I asked where he was going. He said he was seeing a food vender nearby to ask her for something. From experience I noticed that he did not have money. We spoke for awhile and then I gave him some money.
Six days later I heard a beep alerting me of an incoming text. Hurriedly I punched the phone to see what the message was. It read, “Good day LP. This is Jorge. Your decision to counsel me the day I spoke with you has affected me greatly. It has given me a reason to continue to live. Life was meaningless, I just wanted to die. Thank you for your help. Love you.’ Spitting almost half of the water I was sipping in my mouth as I stared at the text. I plucked my glasses off my sweaty face, screwed my eyes and read carefully again hoping I had misread the text. Shockingly I realized it was not a mistake. I feverishly typed, “kindly see me around five in the evening.’
I sat staring at the phone on my desk because it had just dawned on me that I was handling something highly flammable. A gentle voice stroke my heart saying,’ you see, people need help and you were engrossed with your pity party”. I do not know what I would have done if Jorge had passed by me that day along the path with me in high spirits. I may have been scrolling on my phone and muttered a cold hello and not paid attention to him.
2 Corinthians 1:4 (Message Bible)
Well, we met after work and we had a sobering chat. His mother got pregnant out of wedlock and her lover disappeared when he got wind of his mischief. Jorge grew up with his stepfather, mother and siblings. When he was a teenager he recalled his younger brother falling ill and became paralyzed on one side of his body. He died after a short while. His mother, who was selflessly taking care of him also got ill some weeks later. One morning, he bade his mother farewell lovingly but took note of how frail she had become on her sick bed. He was not surprised when he came to meet relatives wailing in the compound of his house when he came back from school. Mummy was gone!
Mummy left behind an eight month old lovely baby girl. Amidst the confusion he lifted up his head and enquired under his breath, “who would take care of this baby.” His baby sister was buried a few days after mummy died.
Jorge’s step father who had not shown him much love did his best now to be nice to him, teaching him how to drive etc. At least light had begun flickering on his path of life. His step father also became unwell and went to his grave shortly after. In a span of four months his future had been scrambled by the icy fingers of death. His family members rubbed it in by branding him a bastard.
This was how he came to know the Lord Jesus Christ. His pastor recommended a seminary and helped him to attend in order to become a priest. Jorge had many questions on his mind and struggled to take care of himself in the seminary. One day he got fed up with asking his mates for food etc and for three days he had neither drunk water nor eaten food. On the fourth day he woke up from his sleep feeling extremely thirsty and saw his roommate who was also a part of the leaders of the student body and well respected in the seminary holding two bottles of water and drinking one. With a patchy throat he asked for some and Ben said “I do not share water with people” nonchalantly.
(Job)(Jorge) grimaced and told me how he had a friend who was not a Christian and would share any food he had scavenged. They ate happily and gratefully be it rotten or good. He wondered why a Christian leader could be heartless in that manner.
In November that year, he decided to end it all. He thought of many ways of doing it and resorted to hanging himself behind one of the buildings in the seminary. As he hung there with six neck ties in place the branch of the tree gave in and broke. With a loud thump, he crushed unto the ground like a bruised fruit. He wept for about two hours as he lay there. Having no more tears to shed on an empty stomach, he pulled himself together and headed to his room. I wondered why no one saw him.
I asked why he never sought for help but he said he felt the lecturing priests seemed too distant and always busy.
This event took place five months before I met him along the path.
Lessons I gleaned from this experience:
People I term highly flammable may be walking around us ready to explode and we need to be extremely sensitive to help them and ignore our petty issues.
Like the priest and levites (Luke 10:30- 37) who kept the sacred utensils and the temple of God, provided sacred loaves, opened and shut the gates of the temple, sang hymns and offered sacrifices etc, we can bypass the neighbour in need to do our work which we feel is important.
The Samaritans of our day are still busy doing our main work for us, obeying the main commandment which is; loving your neighbour, like Job’s unbeliever friend. I believe if he were to be at the seminary, Job would not have thought of committing suicide.
For those of us busy in church our Lord may say “….depart from me, YE ACCURSED, INTO EVERLASTING FIRE, PREPARED FOR THE DEVIL AND HIS ANGELS: …..” Mathew 25: 34-46
This stands to reason that for not giving those who are thirsty water, the hungry food, not taking in strangers etc we are likened to the devil and his angels ready for hell!
In conclusion those in need may be difficult to detect if we are engrossed in ourselves and are highly flammable to do outrageous things which we can prevent and can at the same time cause us to land in hell!
Jorge is stable now, currently undergoing counselling and would be finishing his course in the seminary next year by the grace of God.
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