Hello,
And then there was one.
One chicken left. We started off with 8 chickens. Over the past year, we slowly and sequentially lost four of them, leaving us with four chickens for quite a while. However, the evening before Easter, my wife and I were eating our supper and we looked out into the field below our house and we saw something stirring: a fox. It was bobbing its head up and down, and when we pulled out our binoculars to see exactly what it was doing, we saw that it had something in its mouth. A chicken. The chicken seemed to be flapping its wings a bit, but soon the flapping stopped. The fox dropped it and started making its way back toward our house. Not knowing the extent of its carnage, my wife ran outside to scare it off. Too late. The sprawling of feathers across the ground was evidence that the fox had already made its hit on two other chickens. My wife’s search led her to one un-killed chicken, apparently the next to be snatched by the fox except for my wife’s intervention. Foxes tend to have their litters in the spring, and we suspect that the litter that this fox left behind as went out to hunt was well fed that night with our chickens.
And then there was one.
One nervous, frazzled, lonely chicken.
Ever find yourself akin to this chicken? Alone? In the cross-hairs of a hungry fox? Rightfully fearful and scared? Maybe you feel like the woman caught in adultery who was brought to Jesus, her accusers all too ready to assail her with stones. (John 8:2-12)
If so, here’s the thing. In a world full of voraciously hungry foxes that are out to get you to chew you up, there is one who is out to get you in order to embrace you with forgiveness and mercy. Jesus. That is what Jesus did when that woman of adultery was brought to him. He threw no stones, but instead with forgiveness unchained her from her past. “Go and sin no more,” Jesus said to her, not as a command, but as an invitation to live in the forgiveness that had saved her from hurling stones. Surely, she would sin again. People do. And of this I am certain, when face to face with Jesus again, she would find herself likewise treated by Jesus as he had before.
When I listen to folks, however, this is not the Jesus that they have somehow come to know. To them, Jesus is much more fox-like, ready to condemn unless one obediently stays in the coop. And so, if they find themselves outside the coop, they instinctively run away.
My wife went hunting for the lone un-killed chicken, and when she found it, needless to say it was a bit wary of this one whose arms were reaching out to gather her up. Fear can be all consuming and blinding. But though the chicken quivered and resisted, my wife nonetheless gathered her up and carried her to safety. She was far more like Jesus, than the fox.
So, if you ever find yourself like our sole living chicken…alone and fearful from being hunted by a fox, and you see someone coming up to you with cross-born wounds on their hands and feet, rejoice and be glad. For even though there may be an overpopulation of foxes in this world, there is one who, like my wife reaching out to her chicken, has come to save you, gathering you up in love and mercy.
Have a great week.
God’s grace and peace, (ggap)
Pastor Jerry Nuernberger
No comments:
Post a Comment