Hoop Snakes, Jesus and Oral Roberts

If, unlike me, you never grew up in the rural south, you have probably never heard of a hoop snake. I first began hearing about them when I was about 8 years old.  

Hoop snakes, I was told, grow to terrifying lengths.  Some had been known to attain lengths of 30 feet or more.  Their venom is especially lethal. Cattle weighing a thousand pounds have been known to die within three minutes after being bitten by a hoop snake. I was told they could easily outrun a horse and in fact horses had been known to be killed by hoop snakes. 

How can a snake move so fast? Hoop snakes get their name from an uncanny capability known only to their particular species; the ability to form their body into a hoop by grasping their tail with their jaws. In this unusual configuration they can attain great speeds as they literally roll after their prey. 

When I was a kid,  walking alone on the dusty back roads of southern Missouri, I was always careful to walk in the middle. Weeds and brush on either side could easily conceal a hoop snake, silently waiting for its prey.  Since there was no way one could determine from which side of the road an attack might take place, it was safer to walk in the middle where one would have at least a few feet advantage should a hoop snake give chase.

I had never actually seen a hoop snake, nor had any of my young friends, who warned me about them. But the people who told them knew someone who knew someone who had actually seen one.

Then one summer, an older friend told me he didn't believe hoop snakes existed. I remember not being convinced. How could they not exist when someone, somewhere had actually seen one? It took some time but I finally was able to shed my delusional fear of hoop snakes.

I wonder if Jesus is just another hoop snake. We know he is dangerous because if we don’t believe in him he will see to it that we spend eternity in unbelievable agony.  He makes a hoop snake look like a  teddy bear by comparison.  He leaves no doubt in the Christian bible what he has in mind.  “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” John 14:6

There are of course other parallels. For example no one claims to have actually seen Jesus but we know there are people who knew people who knew people who knew people….we would have to string this thing out for two millenia to finally get to the first person who claimed he actually saw and talked to Jesus.  

Well, actually there is one person.   Oral Roberts.   Some 25 years ago, in 1987, Roberts saw Jesus. He was 900 feet tall. And Jesus spoke to him.  He told Roberts that he (Roberts) needed to raise $4.5 million.  4.5 million in “quick money”, otherwise God was going to kill him.  "'I'm asking you to help me extend my life,” Roberts told his television audience.  “We're at the point where God could call Oral Roberts home.”He asked viewers to send $100 immediately and pledge additional amounts later.

I’m sorry I never had the opportunity to meet Oral. He died in 1992 after god graciously allowed him another five years for raising all that cash.  No doubt his name will go down in the history books as the only person in the 20^th century to ever actually see Jesus.

Unless of course, Jesus really is just another hoop snake.