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Dr. Paul Brand pays testimony to one of his colleagues who was also a good friend right from their medical student days in wartime Britain. His friend was Dr. Richard Dawson. Dr. Dawson graduated, joined the army, and was sent to the Far East where, as a bright, young, happy-go-lucky doctor he was plunged into the hell of a Japanese P.O.W. settlement, as one of those involved in building that infamous Burma-Siam railway.
He was a doctor, but he was helpless as hundreds of fine young men died of dysentery and typhoid, as well as under-nourishment and dehydration. He knew how to save their lives, but he had to watch them die because he had no supplies, no drugs, and no means to sterilise the fluids that might have saved their lives. Yet even in such a death factory Dr. Dawson had hope. He remembered being told that the water in green coconuts was always pure and sterile, and he resolved to use it. He got some young soldiers to climb coconut palms and collect green coconuts. He cut off fibrous ends of the fruit and drilled holes into the shells. He used thin bamboo stems to serve as needles to connect to intravenous needles into the bodies of dehydrated and dying men. Amazingly those treated began to recover.He could see the steaming swamps full of disease and death producing palms which fed on those infected swamp waters, filtered them, purified them and preserved them, and stored them inside the green fruit.
No wonder Dr. Brand called this a miracle of nature, which turns putrefaction into purity, death and disease into life, and reminds his readers that what God can do with a coconut palm in a deadly environment, he can do - only much more so - with living Christians in a deadly and polluted environment. After all, if your soul's roots are in Christ, and if you are rooted in that deep supply the purest of waters, you WILL bear fruit, and it will save lives.
Speaking of the person who is rooted in God:
He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season, and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers. Psalm 1:3
A Prayer:
Lord, in the wasteland of our generation, we pray for those trees which have their roots in you.
A question:
By the way, what kind of people will grow up if their main mental and spiritual nourishment is provided by T.V. soap operas and Hollywood films and horror films?
Now read Ezekiel 47:1-12.
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