FOODFORTHOUGHT

The day is over, you are driving home. You tune in your radio. You hear
a little blurb about a little village in India where some villagers
have died suddenly, strangely, of a flu that has never been seen before.
It's not influenza, but three or four fellows are dead, and it's kind of
interesting. They're sending some doctors over there to investigate it.

You don't think much about it, but on Sunday, coming home from church,
you hear another radio spot. Only they say it's not three villagers,
it's 30,000 villagers in the back hills of this particular area of
India, and it's on TV that night. CNN runs a little blurb; people are
heading there from the disease center in Atlanta because this disease
strain has never been seen before.

By Monday morning when you get up, it's the lead story. For it's not
just India; it's Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, and before you know it,
you're hearing this story everywhere and they have coined it now as
"the mystery flu". The President has made some comment that he and everyone
are praying and hoping that all will go well over there. But everyone
is wondering, "How are we going to contain it?" That's when the President
of France makes an announcement that shocks Europe. He is closing their
borders. No flights from India, Pakistan, or any of the countries where
this thing has been seen.

That night you are watching a little bit of CNN before going to bed.
Your jaw hits your chest when a weeping woman is translated from a
French news program into English: "There's a man lying in a hospital in
Paris dying of the mystery flu. "It has come to Europe. Panic strikes.
As best they can tell, once you get it, you have it for a week and you
don't know it. Then you have four days of unbelievable symptoms. Then
you die. Britain closes it's borders, but it's too late. South Hampton,
Liverpool, North Hampton, and it's Tuesday morning when the President
of the United States makes the following announcement:

"Due to a national security risk, all flights to and from Europe and
Asia have been canceled. If your loved ones are overseas, I'm sorry.
They cannot come back until we find a cure for this thing." Within four
days our nation has been plunged into an unbelievable fear. People are
selling little masks for your face. People are talking about what if it
comes to this country, and preachers on Tuesday are saying, "It's the
scourge of God. "It's Wednesday night and you are at a church prayer
meeting when somebody runs in from the parking lot and says, "Turn on a
radio, turn on a radio." While the church listens to a little
transistor radio with a microphone stuck up to it, the announcement is made," Two
women are lying in a Long Island hospital dying from the mystery flu."
Within hours it seems, this thing just sweeps across the country.

People are working around the clock trying to find an antidote. Nothing
is working. California, Oregon, Arizona, Florida, Massachusetts. It's
as though it's just sweeping in from the borders. Then, all of a sudden
the news comes out. The code has been broken. A cure can be found. A
vaccine can be made. It's going to take the blood of somebody who hasn't been
infected, and so, sure enough, all through the Midwest, through all
those channels of emergency broadcasting, everyone is asked to do one
simple thing: "Go to your downtown hospital and have your blood type
taken. That's all we ask of you. When you hear the sirens go off in
your neighborhood, please make your way quickly, quietly, and safely to the
hospitals." Sure enough, when you and your family get down there late
on that Friday night, there is a long line, and they've got nurses and
doctors coming out and pricking fingers and taking blood and putting
labels on it.

Your wife and your kids are out there, and they take your blood type
and they say, "Wait here in the parking lot and if we call your name, you
can be dismissed and go home." You stand around scared with your
neighbors, wondering what in the world is going on, and that this is
the end of the world. Suddenly a young man comes running out of the
hospital screaming. He's yelling a name and waving a clipboard. What? He yells
it again! And your son tugs on your jacket and says, "Daddy, that's me."
Before you know it, they have grabbed your boy. "Wait a minute, hold
it!" And they say, "It's okay, his blood is clean. His blood is pure.
We want to make sure he doesn't have the disease. We think he has got the
right type."

Five tense minutes later, out come the doctors and nurses, crying and
hugging one another some are even laughing. It's the first time you
have seen anybody laugh in a week, and an old doctor walks up to you and
says, "Thank you, sir. Your son's blood type is perfect. It's clean, it
is pure, and we can make the vaccine." As the word begins to spread all
across that parking lot full of folks, people are screaming and praying
and laughing and crying.

But then the gray-haired doctor pulls you and your wife aside and says,
"May we see you for a moment? We didn't realize that the donor would be
a minor and we need. . . we need you to sign a consent form." You begin
to sign and then you see that the number of pints of blood to be taken
is empty. "H-h-h-how many pints?" And that is when the old doctor's
smile fades and he says, "We had no idea it would be a little child. We
weren't prepared. We need it all!" "But but..." "You don't understand.
We are talking about the world here. Please sign. We - we need it all -
we need it all!" "But can't you give him a transfusion?" "If we had
clean blood we would. Can you sign? Would you sign?" In numb silence
you do. Then they say, "Would you like to have a moment with him before we
begin?"

Can you walk back? Can you walk back to that room where he sits on a
table saying, "Daddy? Mommy? What's going on?" Can you take his hands
and say, "Son, your mommy and I love you, and we would never ever let
anything happen to you that didn't just have to be.

Do you understand that?" And when that old doctor comes back in and
says, "I'm sorry, we've - we've got to get started. People all over the
world are dying." Can you leave? Can you walk out while he is saying,
"Dad? Mom? Dad? Why - why have you forsaken me?"

And then next week, when they have the ceremony to honor your son, and
some folks sleep through it, and some folks don't even come because
they go to the lake, and some folks come with a pretentious smile and just
pretend to care. Would you want to jump up and say, "MY SON DIED! DON'T
YOU CARE?"

Is that what God is saying? "MY SON DIED. DON'T YOU KNOW HOW MUCH I
CARE?"

PRAYER

"Father, seeing it from your eyes breaks our hearts. Maybe now we begin
to comprehend the great love you have for us. Amen "

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