Sunday, November 12, 2006

A Tale of 2 Mexicans


On Friday of last week while on Grafton Street at about 1 am (Saturday therefore) 2 Mexican guys approached me as I held the large “John 3:7” sign. One was very talkative and as soon as I said that Jesus said “You must be born again” and explained the simple meaning of this he began to attempt to justify himself by means of his religious tradition. As the discussion progressed it became clear to me that this person had never experience the reality of Jesus and so I declared that He was with us and that if either of them had any sickness Jesus could touch them and heal them now. As soon as I said this the 2nd Mexican, who had been virtually silent up to this time, said that he had a bad back and that he would like prayer. I laid my hand on his shoulder and asked Jesus to touch him and instantly, without prompting, he looked amazed and said the pain had gone.

While he was still wide eyed and moving his back to be sure of his healing the first chap continued in his own justification as before. I was amazed that the healing of his friend by Jesus had so little impact on him, but I remembered that when Jesus healed the sick as recorded in the gospels some of the religious had such hard hearts that they wanted to have him arrested and put away. This spoke to me about hard hearts and that when people have lots of questions these same questions may not be roadblocks to the faith they’d like to have but may be diversionary tactics to avoid the conviction of the Holy Spirit. Thank God not all have such hard hearts.