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Summer 2010
You may have read the book or seen the movie, "Bridge over the River Kwai". It is the story of WWII soldiers captured and forced to build a railroad through the jungles of Thailand. The men worked in unbearable conditions. Their bodies were stung by insects and ravaged by disease. Their feet were bare and cut by stones. If a prisoner slowed, a guard would beat him to death in full view of the other prisoners. The conditions were so brutal that 80,000 men died trying to build that railroad - 393 corpses for every mile of track.
The surviving prisoners lived like animals. The strong would beat the weak for a few grains of rice. Hate kept them alive. It was a culture of death, until one amazing day. A work detail had finished when one of the guards shouted that a shovel was missing and demanded to know who had stolen it. Nobody confessed, so he screamed that everybody on the work crew was going to die. He took his rifle, aimed it at the first guy in line, and was going to kill them all. Suddenly one of the men stepped forward and said, "No, don't! I did it. I stole it." The guard kicked and beat him until life left his body. Later, when the tools were inventoried again, no shovel was missing. No one had stolen anything. That night, one of the prisoners quoted a Bible verse to the rest of the group; Greater love has no one than this, Jesus said, that a man lay down his life for his friends. (John 15:13)
Something happened and everything changed. Prisoners started to treat the dying with respect, started giving them funerals, started marking the graves with a cross. And people who were strong began to give their food to people who were weak. Ernest Gordon was there. He was paralyzed with fever. He had been laid out in the "Death House". It was a shack where the sick were put until they died. They always died. Gordon had written his final letter to his parents and closed his eyes to die.
Some men came in and carried him out. They gave him their food. They massaged his leg muscles and cleaned his latrine. He had not thought about God for a long time, but now he did. They formed a little church right in the middle of a death camp. Ernest Gordon became the unofficial pastor. They planted a garden there to grow medicinal plants to help people who were sick. This is an amazing story. They formed what they called "The Jungle University". They started teaching courses in History, Philosophy and Science in nine languages, including Latin, Greek, and Russian. They created an alternative culture. Jesus has a name for that culture: The Kingdom of God. These men became so transformed that when the liberating armies finally arrived, instead of taking revenge on their guards, they treated the guards with kindness, mercy and forgiveness. Gordon's life was turned upside down. He became a minister and later served as the chaplain of Princeton University. He wrote his own book telling the story, how it all started with one person who chose selflessly for others.
Jesus told us, 'You are the salt of the earth'. You are it. You. That's what Jesus says. He's not giving a command here. He doesn't say, try to be salty, or work hard to get saltier. He's making an observation: You're the salt of the earth. That's hard for most of us to believe. We are the salt of the earth. Salt does not exist for its own sake. It exists to be immersed in something else. That is when it does its finest work. When someone becomes so immersed in Jesus and His presence and His love and His goodness...anytime someone is so immersed in Jesus that they start to be liberated from the threats and rewards that keep them enslaved to their little culture...they start to get free. And when people get free, everything changes. Then God does His finest work. Next time you sprinkle your food with salt, remember and pray, Lord I want to be free, pour my life out Lord. Pour my life out Lord and set me free.
In His Service,
Bill Rowley
CFS Principal
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