Heaven can Wait, Court tells dying man

Oddly Enough - Reuters
ROME (Reuters) - A man given six months to live by his doctors has been told by an Italian court to come back in 14 months to hear the outcome of his demand for insurance damages.

Carmelo Cisabella, 39, has an inoperable spine disease and is anxious to pick up some $596,300 in already-agreed damages from his insurers to help ease his final months of life, Il Messaggero newspaper reported Tuesday.
In a bid to speed up the process, Cisabella turned to the Sicilian courts to put pressure on the slow-moving insurers, but was told to return next year to hear their decision.
In his frustration, he chained himself to the gates of the law courts to bring attention to his plight.
Il Messaggero said Cisabella's woes dated back more than a decade when he was left paralyzed by a motorcycle accident. Confined to a wheelchair, he subsequently developed a lethal infection of the spine.
The insurance claim dates back to the road crash.
Italian justice is notoriously slow and it takes on average 3,041 days to obtain a definitive sentence in a civil case.


And Now for my two cents worth....

Ever feel like you just aren't being heard? Well, mom and dad, here's your opportunity to say "I told you so".... I don't have kids of my own, but I do understand what it's like to talk to teenagers and feel like they're in orbit somewhere and my words are completely missing them. That goes with the territory of being a youth pastor. I am happy to say that I do not believe that I will have to chain myself to the doors of the youth room for them to hear the message. But the image there brings up an interesting thought.....the man in Rome had to chain himself to the courthouse for the courts to hear him adequately....they had heard him but not adequately. In short, they had not LISTENED. I spoke to my youth group last night on a topic that bears weight for us all. Our friends that do not know Christ and His saving power are literally in chains. Maybe not on their physical bodies, but definitely on their souls. But do we adequately listen? Do we hear their plights? Their deaths are not only more certain, but carry worse results than the man who has been given 6 months due to a spinal infection.....but do we hear their cries for life? Do we see past the facade that their bodies put up to shield their souls, the ones that say "everythings great, I'm happy doing it my way" and see that their hearts cry out for salvation? What will it take for us to LISTEN. Have we even tried tuning in lately? Do we even try to look past the surface? I would guess that far too many of us "leave it in God's hands" and go about our merry, saved way, forgetting that God told us to "Go, and make disciples of all nations"-Matthew 28. As Christians, we need to get back to some basics of living, the first being that there are others who are dead men walking. They need life, but they are chained to death. They cry out for help, for love, for salvation. Can you hear them?