Poor Cab Driver

“Poor Cab Driver”
Lent 2009 – Day 28 (Mar 28)

By Deshi Ramadhani, SJ

I took a cab to rush to the airport earlier this morning. Well, nothing new, just getting late, again! [Guess what? As if just for a change, the flight has just been delayed! I’m typing this at the airport]. Once I hopped in, the cab driver told me about the nightmare he had just had. He had the night shift, and since 3 a.m. I was his first passenger! The radio communication didn’t work at all. A computer error disrupted the whole system. Usually by the time I hopped in, he had had four or five trips in between.

[I had to stop typing. You know why the flight was delayed? The co-pilot came late due to some ground transportation problems. Whatever that was, I had to board the airplane, and since then, five days have passed]. What a symbolic picture of my relationship with God. As with the operator from the central office, God has always been busy to contact me. I have been busy waiting to listen to God’s voice. Strangely, God can’t reach me, and I can’t hear the voice. So here I am, wandering with no clear sense of where to go and what to do, and none the less, blaming God, the operator at the central office, for not giving me clear orders!

Among many other computer errors in my communication with God, I can see one: I’m so sure that I already know so much about God! Jesus found the same problem in his opponents. They knew so much about how the Messiah was supposed to be, and unconsciously kept filtering Jesus with what they knew. Jesus who knew a lot better was treated like an ignorant lamb being led to the slaughter-house! What an irony! Yes, I am in fact that poor cab driver. Instead of blaming God, I need to fix my heart’s computer, by humbly saying: “Jesus, here I am, I don’t want to filter you with my knowledge. Help me to let you love me deeply.”