Retreat

I had the privilege of spending the last three days alone in retreat at Mi Dacha in Hudson, MI. It was a delight!

Some of the highlights:
1. Quiet
2. The Holy Spirit providing clarity as I studied scripture.
3. Lots of reading.
4. The voice of the Lord. Our conversations were needed and blessed.
5. Fishing. I caught like fifty bass. Seriously!
6. Watching three fawns, still sporting their spots, and their mama come to within about thirty feet of me.
7. Enormous butterflies. Multi-colored dragonflies. Myriad birds.
8. Campfires.

I had a strange experience, too. I had built a fire and placed a larger log on it in order to strengthen it. As I was doing this, suddenly a large ant ran directly into the flame and was instantly burnt to smithereens. I wondered why s/he had done that. Didn't seem prudent. I shrugged it off.

Later, I was reading as I sat near the blaze and noticed one of those large, flying grasshoppers inside of the fire-ring. This seemed strange in light of the significant heat from the fire. I concluded that the hopper had simply wandered too close by mistake. This was confirmed when it wandered back out of the ring soon after.

I was shocked, then, to see the deluded grasshopper back in the ring not long after. In fact, in a sort of bizarre act of apparent suicide, it darted directly into the flames! I guess it changed its mind at the last moment, however, and popped back out, flew over to, and sat on a rock.

At this point, I figured the hopper was fried so I went over to look at it. It was alive but not moving I much. I reached down to pick it up but it flew away instead. I thought to myself, "You scared it. It flew away. You helped save it from itself." I went back to reading yet contemplating what the attraction of the fire was for the grasshopper.

A couple of minutes later, I noticed that my friend had returned and was headed for the flame again! I could not believe it. Somehow s/he ended up on a grilling grate that sat quite near the fire and was surely very hot due to its proximity. Sure enough, the hopper kept lifting its tiny legs in a peculiar dance as if keeping them on the metal was just too much to stand. It looked like a firewalker.

A short time after, the hopper apparently concluded that fire was dangerous and flew off permanently.

The story is not over yet, however (sorry!).

Within ten minutes a juvenile sparrow had flown down from a tree and hopped right up to the fire. It hopped into the fire-ring and was within a foot of the flames. This happened a couple of times. It also made an appearance on the grate as well before its parents called it for supper.

Perhaps I'm just paranoid but after observing these strange occurrences I thought maybe the Lord was trying to tell me something. It struck me that these animals experiences of fire are not so different than human experiences with spiritual fire. We often conceive of hell as being a fiery place where God angrily tosses us when we have been naughty. But we also know that the Lord desires than none of His children would perish. Not one. He is full of compassion, you see.

It strikes me that it is instead our indiscretion, pride, and belief that we can handle our lives on our own that leads us into the flames, just as these animals I observed made their own way into the campfire. We in essence throw ourselves into the flames. God does not do it for us. Despite His gentle warnings and loving nudges, We choose the burning flames over the comfort of His arms.

If we are full of compassion, we will continue to befriend and love ones who venture perilously close to the fire. Perhaps our stories of what the Lord has done for us will help them to choose Life as well. Perhaps our abiding support will make an impact.

We cannot prevent anyone from throwing themselves into the flame but we can encourage a different way.

~ Just musing away


Jeff