***This isn’t “farm” related, but I did feel impressed to share this short story today. My prayer is that you will take time to reflect and be encouraged and give your life to The One whom we REFLECT.***
She was surrounded by darkness. This wasn’t the kind of dark where you could still see the outline of shapes or detect movement. This was darkness that swallowed you. She could see absolutely nothing, but she could hear, smell and taste everything. It was humid outside. Outside? Yes! She was outside! Okay, now we are getting somewhere, she thought. I’m outside, but I cannot see anything. I can taste the moisture in the air and smell the musk of animals. I hope those are someone’s pets and not wild animals. She could hear crickets and frogs and the wind blowing in the trees.
She was afraid to move. What if she tripped over something or someone? How did she get here, where was here? She was in a forest maybe? She could hear branches moving in the soft wind. Reaching around her, she realized she was sitting on the ground. Total darkness. She could feel dirt and some grass, leaves, and twigs all around her. She began to crawl slowly forward, or what seemed like forward to her.
She felt a tree root and then placed her hand on a tree. It was large and she had only moved a few inches. She stood and reached out then, in both directions with her arms and she could touch trees on both sides. That’s why it was so dark. She must be in a thick group of trees. Their branches were reaching up to a canopy that was so thick that it let in no light at all. Maybe the moon wasn’t shining and there was cloud cover? That would add to the darkness.
She leaned against the nearest tree and tried to think about what she could last remember. If she could figure out how she got here, maybe she could figure out how to get out of here. She leaned her head back against the thick tree and closed her eyes, not that it changed much, but it did help her focus. What could she last recall? Darkness. Yes, she had gone to bed and switched off the lamp. She had laid down on her pillow and savored the stillness of the darkness. No phones, no people, no noise, just the blackness of her bedroom and the peace of those few minutes right before she drifted off to sleep…She had dreamed, or prayed, about them. Them. The people all around her every day; the ones that needed more than she could give. They needed her time, her words, her knowledge, but some days it just wasn’t enough and even after she gave and gave, they just wanted more.
The more she gave, the more they wanted and the more they wanted the more she realized she had nothing left to give. She was exhausted at the end of the day and sleep was no longer replenishing her. She woke up every morning more spent than the night before and every day, she felt that she could sense the life being sucked out of her and that one day she just might not wake up. All the life might have drained out, just like her phone battery that warned low battery and then just blinked off, with barely a warning.
Get it together! You are drifting again and now is not the time!
Yes, she remembered that she was lying in the dark, thinking, dreaming, praying about sinking into it all. In the darkness, she had wished herself into some alternate reality where she could recharge her dead battery and wake in the morning with all the world’s answers. But this was not that place? Or was it?
Distracted thinking again wasn’t helping her. She touched the tree with her left hand and stretched her right hand out in front of her until she reached another tree. She moved her body forward, or again what seemed like forward. At least she was going somewhere.
She continued ahead, keeping her left hand on a tree and finding another with her right. She took baby steps, but it was movement. After a few minutes, she stopped and listened. She could still hear night sounds. She thought the moisture in the air had changed and the wind seemed to be blowing around her, ever so slightly. Maybe the weather was changing?
She pressed on a little farther, continuing to use the trees as her guides, praying under her breathe that they wouldn’t end and leave her in the open before morning came. Morning would come right? It had to. “Weeping may last for the night, but joy comes in the morning.” The words of her grandmother came quickly to her thoughts. I’m not crying yet, but I will start if it makes morning come! Her thoughts were always such a distraction.
She kept moving from tree to tree for what seemed like hours. Stopping every few minutes to listen. After a bit longer, she eased herself down to the ground with her “left hand” tree to her back, trying to keep herself from getting lost or backtracking. She leaned her head back on the tree and closed her eyes. Water! She could hear water running. It sounded like a creek. Not rushing water, like the rapids she had been down before, but a definite trickle. It reminded her of the creek she had played in as a child. The water seemed to be slightly to the right of her. She stood and held onto the tree at her back with her left hand and moved her body to the right and found a tree!
She hurried forward, from tree to tree, like a monkey swinging from vine to vine. She had to make herself slow down when she tripped over a root. She stopped and listened. The water was closer and getting louder and she realized she could see a bit of light. Like the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel! Get a hold of yourself, she almost said it out loud. No sense in loosing your head now, she scolded herself to herself. She slowed the pace and tried to focus her eyes on the light ahead. She could see the outline of trees. There must be a break in the canopy near the creek and it was enough to let a sliver of light down to the ground.
The air also felt a bit cooler and drier. The weather was changing, and the cloud cover must be moving as well. Even though she wasn’t out of this mess, at least she was coming out of the darkness. It had been overwhelming and suffocating. She made her way through the trees and as her eyes adjusted, she could see the creek. It was only about 3 feet wide, with trees on both sides. Maybe, if she could follow the creek, it would take her somewhere. Anywhere was better than this nowhere. So, she turned to the right and began to follow the creek downstream. The light wasn’t much, but the moon was lighting her path.
Ahead, the sound of running water seemed to almost disappear and she could tell that the trees were farther apart. She slowed her pace and tried to adjust her eyes as more and more light shown down and revealed what was ahead. The creek had opened to a pond or lake and the moon, which looked completely full, was entirely reflected in the water.
As she stood to take it all in, she heard a voice. It was a familiar voice; one she hadn’t heard out loud in quite a long time. She strained to see where the voice was coming from and then noticed ripples in the reflection of the moon on the water. The ripples were coming from feet that were walking on the water towards her. “Give your life to the One who makes the moon reflect the sun. Just like the moon, child. You have no light without His.” It was her grandmother’s voice. That statement was something she had heard the woman say many times.
“You can’t pour out of an empty glass, child. Just like the moon can’t shine without the sun.”
The movement in the water caught her attention again and in the reflection of the moon, she saw Him. His eyes held hers for a moment and as He reached out His hand, she felt the world tilt and spin. As her hand touched His, she felt a warm sensation begin to move up her arm. The warmth spread through her body until it reached her chest. She felt as if she just might burst. Energy, joy, peace, all these and more began to race through her body and she didn’t want to let go of His hand.
Then, her vision began to blur and it was hard to see His face. She shook her head to remove the fog that had drifted in and clouded her eyes and suddenly, she heard a strange noise. She shook herself again and blinked. The sunlight was coming in the window and the dreaded alarm clock was buzzing. She looked at her phone. Battery fully charged, the alarm clock had been going off for a while. She laid there and tried to recall His eyes, but all she heard were those words, “Give your life to the One who makes the moon reflect the sun…”
The true light, which gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. He was in the world, and the world was made through him, yet the world did not know him. He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him. But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. (John bore witness about him, and cried out, “This was he of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me ranks before me, because he was before me.’”) For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. John 1: 9-16 ESV
