Letter from a traveler in a far country

Dear Dad,

I just don’t understand these people, they are so pushy. First Emma puts me on the spot at the wedding. “They’re out of wine, don’t let my friends be embarrassed in front of their guests, please, son.”

And even after I tell her to chill out, that I’m not ready to go public, she still tells the servants, “Do what he tells you, “ and they run get water to be turned into wine! So what do I have to do to keep Mama happy but start doing miracles.

And then I heal the leper and tell him not to tell everybody, so I can keep on teaching in all the villages, and what does he do? Go and blab to all the lepers he knows, “this guy can heal us and restore us to being normal human beings! Run, crawl or drag yourself to him!” You’d think there was no other way to be clean, the way every leper and his cousin came out of the woodwork.

Remember when my friend was so sick, and I told my students, “its OK, we don’t have to go rushing back, he’ll be alright.” But no, they got all hot and bothered, “he’s gonna die, we know it.” And sure enough, he did, these people are so fragile, the least thing and they slip away. I had no idea how weak and sickly they are, and how everybody freaks out when someone gets sick. His sisters, you should have seen his sisters, crying and being hysterical – like they thought he’d stay dead! Dad, that really got to me. And the widow burying her only son! Talk about pushy, she was desperate. “I’m being put out on the street, he was my only hope, help me!” and now I’m going around healing the dead! Remind me to stay away from the cemeteries, they’re all popping back up.

The sick just keep pouring out of the houses. In church on Sunday I had to heal a man with a paralyzed arm because he got up and made a ruckus. You should have seen the ushers, they almost had a coronary. And the lady with cervical cancer, and the little dead girl and on and on. You’d think there wasn’t a decent doctor in the whole country!

I can’t even walk down the street without having the blind scream out, “Son of David, heal me!” I guess the eye surgeon costs too much for them and their Seeing Eye dog died! What is it with these people?

You know, Dad, you were right to send me here and live among them and see how they really live and feel. Where we live things are calm, we can take the long view and know that things are going to work out well. But people here are frantic, their lives hang by a thread, and they know it. They used to live hundreds of years, travel, learn, enjoy seeing multiple generations of descendents, but now they are like the grass and flowers which bloom for just one season. No wonder they are so impatient, so desperate. I had no idea how bad things really are for them.

You know, Dad, the only ones who aren’t happy to have me arrive, are the nasties that foul up so many hearts down here? As soon as they get near me, they scream, “Get away from us, Son of the Most High! Are you going to send us back to the abyss so soon, it’s not time yet?” Well, I guess they are the only things that aren’t happy to see me so soon, but that is not the kind of publicity I want.

Dad, I guess the worst thing is that I can’t stay here forever. How can I go back home and leave these people to keep on shriveling and dying? I’d like to teach my students how to heal and do all the neat things I do, but they hardly believe what they see me doing every day. I can give them the power to do it, but lifetimes of suffering and misery have almost destroyed their faith that we can fix things. If they would just step out in faith! Some times putting up with them almost makes me despair that they will ever catch on. There is so little time and so much to teach them. Oh no, I almost caught their desperation!

Well, thanks for listening, Dad, I feel better already.

Your loving son