There are plenty of challenges ahead for Al and he may never return to a normal life, even if he gets to walk again, as expected. Medical staff warned that he could still develop complications, even life-threatening ones, but to survive such a fall and be able to talk afterwards is more than amazing. Touch was his only means of comunication for 3 weeks. His wife Rosario held his hand. “He wanted to touch my face, touch my hair,” she said. Then she heard that he had touched a nurse and she jokingly told him to keep his hands to himself. He replied with his first words, “What did I do?” Rosario was stunned. He could talk!
The analogy for Christians is fairly obvious, but not pondered often enough. Somehow we’ve blamed Adam and Eve for “The Fall,” but we have not considered the personal fall each of us has taken and often keeps taking. We’d like to acknowledge the sin of humankind, but not the sin of this kind of human — this specific human with my initials. Sure, the first man and woman blew it and got their consequences, but how does that relate to me? I’m not taking a great fall and I won’t require many surgeries or much blood. A misstep here or there, a white lie now and then, but nothing like a 47-story fall. Some even ask, “What did I do?”
Your sin may not make the headlines. It/they may not even be judged by any other human as all that bad, but when compared with the purity and perfection of our Creator, it’s at least a 47-story fall. And, as in Al’s case, it is truly amazing, even a miracle that any of us survives. The reality that God has not zapped us all for our selfishness, self-promotion and self-preoccupation is great evidence of his patience. “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,” Paul affirms in Romans 3:23, but then he adds, “and are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.” Later, he writes, “God demonstrates His own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8). Genuine, life-changing faith in Jesus is the only appropriate response.
How in the world did this window washer survive? No one really knows, but some think he may have clung to his scaffolding platform as it dropped and it may have offered him some protection. To what are you clinging? What is your scaffolding and to what is it tied? Have you checked the ropes lately? May I urge you to cling to the only True Savior, Jesus Christ, no matter how great or small the fall? You may think your fall is so severe, Christ can’t save you. He can! You may think your fall is so minor, you don’t need protection. You do!
Article copyright (c) 2009 by Charles G. Mickey. All rights reserved.
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