Maui Memories

When I visited Maui last month, I admired the lush vegetation and beautiful flowers. The impatiens and dusty millar were twice as high as in my garden. I even saw a 100-year-old mango tree. One particular kind of bird intrigued me, however. It looked like a dove with white-tipped wings.

This bird appeared unaware of its surroundings. Once, as my husband and I walked down the concrete pathway to our hotel room, I spotted this bird standing by the nearby wall. Although my husband stepped a few inches from this bird, it never flinched. A few days later the bird looked as if it was waiting for us by our door. It never flew away as we approached and seemed oblivious to a cat peering intently at it several feet away.

This bird reminded me of our spiritual condition before we accept Jesus as our Lord and Saviour. The Bible says that everyone is born spiritually dead. We were born with a sin nature because of Adam and Eve’s rebellion in the Garden of Eden. Since this is true, it does not take very long before we personally commit sin.

Just like that bird, dead people do not react. We are utterly incapable of responding to God and blind to spiritual realities. The Holy Spirit must first lovingly open our hearts to hear the Lord speak through his Word, the Bible. Only by the grace of God do spiritually dead people become alive. What a precious gift of God!

“As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient” (Ephesians 2:1, 2 NIV).

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