There was a man who faithfully ate at the same diner day after day. The food was not terribly healthy, but he remarked each day with a satisfied pat on his full belly, “It gets the job done!” The waiting staff would always laugh along with him.
One day, he found a small pebble in his food. He was shocked since he had nearly eaten it! He carefully avoided the small stone, pushing it off his plate with his fork, and called attention to the waitress. He quickly forgave the offense, then patted his full belly and remarked with a forgiving chuckle, “It gets the job done!”
Days later, however, the same offense occurred, this time with three pebbles! He had only realized it after swallowing one of the small stones lodged in an unsuspecting bite towards the end of his meal. Fearful, he sharply pushed the plate away, gravely concerned for his health, and began to interrogate the waitress. But a self-proclaimed nutritionist also frequented the diner and interrupted the conflict confidently saying, “My dear fellow, a small pebble can hardly do you much harm! Relax! Drink! You will not surely die!”
The man relaxed. Took a long deep gulp from his water glass, and marveled at how the nutritionist had calmed him with such a confident and favorable diagnosis. He leaned back and grinned, surprised at how good he felt, after having swallowed a rock no less! Perhaps his nutritional assumptions were really just unfounded overreactions to societal expectations. As he left he patted his satisfied belly and said with a slightly more triumphant chuckle “Yes! It still does get the job done!”
The occurrence became ordinary at the diner, but the man was no longer bound to his dreadful and outdated assumptions. It was just easier to let the professional nutritionist do his thinking for him.
By now the pebbles grew in size and in number while the portion of real food grew smaller and scarcer. But he paid the rocks no mind - always sure to boldly swallow at least one or two if only to prove to himself that he could! And he declared to every patron in the restaurant that same emboldening phrase which had become almost a mantra, “I will not surely die!” And then, with all the vigor and vim he’d had before, he would give his bulging belly a hearty and familiar slap with both hands, grinning and hollering, “It gets the job done!”
The days turned to weeks and the man faithfully ate his daily portion of stones. By now the helpings of real food that were put in front of him were scarcely more than a mouthful, with gravel taking up most of his plate. But he had become accustomed to his new diet and devoured the stones so quickly and so unflinchingly that other stone-eaters in the diner marveled.
Given more time, the man became a proud stone-eater. Pounding no less than a dozen rocks for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. He became the talk of the diner, and his pride soared. The staff even had a shirt made for him that said, “Chief of Rock-Eaters!”
Over time he became an encyclopedia of culinary-geodes, able to describe the taste and texture of various stones with such detail that it would cause the mouths of others to salivate. He also started an interest club for rock-eaters of all levels.
The club grew into a roaring new line of videos, diet guides, and life coaching resources. Before long he was posing for magazines and publishing articles - critics beware! He was living proof of the wonderful benefits of the new StoneDiet™! All of his well-branded merchandise bore one of two slogans, either: “It gets the job done!” or “You will not surely die!
The benefits of the diet included (among many other things): Affordability (rocks are cheaper than food!), Satisfaction (rocks fill up your stomach far quicker than food!), Weight-Loss (rocks cut calories and carbs like you wouldn’t believe!), and Popularity (being a rock-eater is edgy!). And thats not even to make mention of what a great conversation starter it is!
His commercials almost always featured perfectly-modeled women who were unable to contain their sensual desires for an edgy-looking rock-eating dude.
As you can imagine, his teeth did suffer terribly, ground down nearly to his gum line. But the popularity afforded him the finances to mask the ugliness with dentures, and the man continued his rock eating with no real concern.
When an old family-friend (a Doctor) suggested that rock-eating was detrimental to one’s health and had a mortality rate of 100%, the man threw up his hands and raved. He could hardly bear the sound of the Doctor’s voice. To the popular, published, and seemingly-healthy rock-eater the Doctor’s words were like nails on a chalk-board. He spit back vitriolically at the Doctor, “I will NOT surely die!” and “It gets the job done!”
About this time, at the height of his achievements, he began to notice a subtle growl begin to develop from deep within his gut. Quiet at first. The kind of growl you only feel. But then with time the rumbling grew both loud and violent, with sharp pains piercing him intermittently.
The man could not seem to put his finger on the source of his agonizing pain. He told a friend about it and the friend suggested, “Perhaps it’s something you ate?” He quickly thanked the friend for their concern with a mild condescension and then dismissed the theory saying, “I’m eating what I’ve always eaten. It gets the job done.”
Day after day the man ate stones for breakfast, and for lunch, and for dinner. Stones of all shapes, sizes, colors, textures, and densities now comprised most of his diet except for rare meetings with family or old friends. He had become a proud aficionado, and shared his passion with almost any passerby.
Yet his undiagnosed pain grew each day. He developed a tremor and his movements became slow and painful. He also developed a terrible slur, and no matter how hard he tried to be heard most people could not bear to listen very long to his incoherent ramblings about rocks, which now made them feel uncomfortable. Soon he could hardly hold a conversation without vomiting. Sometimes his episodes of acid-reflux were painful, other times embarrassing, and other times they were downright violent.
His countenance fell, his eyes lost their shine, and he no longer chuckled with his waitress as he sat in the diner booth day after day. He still ate his portion of stones, but was no longer much good in conversations since his friends all feared his violent fits of puking, and could hardly stand to listen to him for more than a couple minutes. With great effort and terrible pain he would pull himself up to his feet after each meal, trying to hold it in. And with a strange detachment and distant stare would tenderly hold his fragile belly, staring at the floor, and with a small unconvincing smile mouth the words “It gets the job done.”
His pain was excruciating, loathsome, and unbearable. And though it were only a few years since the nutritionist had said, “you will not surely die,” he now felt like dying. So he lay in bed, unable to get up and go to the Diner that had become more or less a second home.
One day, as he slipped in and out of consciousness, alone and afraid, he felt death begin to creep up on him, and he realized that he was without hope of recovering. Then, all at once, he felt the stones bulging in his stomach cavity turning and grinding against each other. And suddenly he knew - firmly and without any measure of doubt, the destruction the stones had wreaked in his body. He wept bitterly - an ugly and gargling cry. And with one great heave and with all the strength left in his pitiful body he slurred the words of defeat: “It never got the job done!” And he wept through vomit and pain crying, “Help! Help! Help!”
And as day turned to night he thought in his mind, “How stupid I have been! Surely, I am about to die!” And “Look at me now on my deathbed made of stones.”
That very hour, covered in the shame of vomit and misery from the grinding rocks, and grey with death, and in utter exhaustion, just then The Doctor knocked on the man’s Door. And though he had been a dead man, he somehow received the strength to stagger to the door and fall upon the handle. There, in great pain and agony he, opened it and collapsed to the floor.
The Doctor carefully picked up the good-as-dead man from off the floor. He laid him down on a green couch while he restored the bedsheets and stripped him of his vomit-covered clothes. He took his own jacket from off himself and covered the man in it. The same man who once had been so violently angry with him. The same man who built a self-destructive empire of cheap-satisfaction and had covered his shame with false teeth. And the Doctor - once a stone rejected - became the cornerstone of the dying man’s life.
When the man awoke the Doctor was in his home, at his bedside, feeding him Bread and giving him Water. Patiently, gently, slowly.
Within hours the light began to comeback to the man’s eyes. Within days the vomitous fits became less frequent and the acute and piercing pain began to wane. And though his Doctor was clear that the recovery would be long and that time and pain would be a part of soothing the trauma, He also promised he would never leave.
The man and the Doctor became fast friends and over the years they would chuckle as they’d eat together in the man’s home. And from time to time the man would stop... and with humbled tears in his eyes, and as deep gratitude welled up in his soul, he would say “You really got the job done.”
And they would take long walks to the diner, where the doctor would say sweetly to it’s patrons: “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.” - Revelation 3:20
