April 14, 2007
Thursday was a hard day on the farm.
As one whose theological curiousity is shaped much by observing nature, Thursday was a difficult day of questions. Upon arriving home from work, the chicken coop door was open but the chickens were not to be seen. Instead of the group happily scratching about in the pasture with the old rooster keeping watch as is usual, there was only one small red hen visible near the wood pile. She seemed afraid.
I quickly got inside the house and changed out of my work shoes into something more pasture appropriate and ran out toward the horse paddocks. Behind the garage I saw the only remaining feathers of what had been one of the gold hens. My stomach dropped at the thought of what had happened.
I ran faster and lifted the heavy corral gate to unlatch it. The horses were watching me expectedly but it wasn’t their usual look of hoping for treats. They were uncertain. Dashing around the stable I saw what I thought was the old rooster out of the corner of my eye headed for the coop. Whatever it was, it was black. Just as I reached the corner a coyote the size of a German Shepherd bolted across my path. I yelled and clapped and chased after it and it skittered across the arena and waited on the other side of the fence.
There was Molly, the favorite hen of my landlord’s eleven year old daughter, the only one who had been named. She had just been killed and still laid there as if asleep except for a little blood around her broken neck. My fears were confirmed. I knelt down and petted her and told her I was sorry — what if I had gone straight out instead of changing my shoes?
The little banty rooster poked his head out from beside the barn and crowed. Molly was the only hen who had been nice to him. I coaxed him toward the coop reassuringly. Two hens followed suit and I shut the three of them safe inside. I called for the others and searched the pasture for any other signs of life. The coyote was still waiting near the woods and I yelled at him to take off.
My landlord arrived shortly after, thankfully without her daughter. She knew what had happened as soon as she saw my face. We carefully lifted Molly’s body into a feed bag and placed her on the hood of the truck. We spent the next hour and a half shaking the grain buckets and calling for anymore surviving chickens. The big, old rooster came tentatively out of a tree after twenty minutes or so. He had puncture wounds on his head and his tail was gone. He approached cautiously, checking from one side to the other all the way across the field. Four more hens showed up before dark as we continued to call. They all came carefully out of the woods. Those were all that remained. We accounted for the other ten by the clusters of their feathers in various spots around the yard. Even the little poofy one who could fly a bit had been taken.
Friday I found the little grave pictured above near the chicken coop. The landlord’s daughter had wanted to bury Molly and create this memorial. The cross seemed like an appropriate burial marker.
Do chickens go to heaven?
Today, I sure hope so.
April 4, 2007
I surf through a few tags in the blog world every now and then: church, Christianity, faith, cats. The cat posts are generally cute or sweet or enjoyable – encouraging mostly. Apart from the possible argument of “inside” vs “outside,” there isn’t much to fight about in the cat world. Oh, people should spay and neuter and be responsible pet owners for the life of their pet as opposed to the life of their convenience or cuteness, but you know, for the most part, cat posts in the blogosphere seldom digress into rants. Church, Christianity and faith on the otherhand, well, it’s embarrassing.
I’m “inspired” today by one particular post I read a few weeks ago. I don’t remember where it was or who wrote it. If I did, I wouldn’t provide the link anyway. A new one can be found in several of the twenty posts that come up in any Church/Christianity/faith tag on any day. The author is always right, anyone who differs is wrong, and the proof texts backing up their argument are amply and aggressively provided — usually in bold type.
The post I read was written by a man consoling those of us unfortunate to have been created female. He was sorry that Scripture doesn’t allow for women to speak in church and he expressed his understanding that submitting to our husbands as God commands must sometimes be a difficult burden to carry. He continued with his list of things women are clearly not allowed to do based on Scripture. He even provided the Biblical proof texts in bold type so we could be certain.
His topic and content are not the focus of my post. The problem really is proof text arguments in general. My experience has been that these arguments typically begin at the back end of the argument first – the ass end so to speak. Those presenting them already hold some deeply entrenched position on a perceived issue in the church or American life or whatever and then scurry about through Scripture finding all the choicest texts that support said position. They are right. Everyone else is wrong. The weakness in this approach is simple: you show me your proof texts and I’ll show you mine. It just seems all around uncomfortably wrong somehow doesn’t it?
March 24, 2007
I created a list of people I know who don’t know Jesus. It’s a short list. It’s not short because I don’t know a lot of friends, co-workers and acquaintances who don’t know Jesus, but because I wanted to focus on being able to pray for a few in particular. The list is a gimmick for me, not for God. It just helps keep me aware and looking for what God might be doing around me. I need help being aware in that regard.
I struggled with the last couple of names on my list. I had seven lines. I’d determined five people. The individuals I chose for these last two lines are people I don’t know very well. I see them only on occassion and it is by chance meeting, not by appointment. By the standards Americans typically use to rank people (consciously or not), they would rank above me. They have a lot of money. They own a lot of property. They roll in ridiculously cool vehicles. I am personally indebted to them in many ways and most certainly lower on the status ladder.
So, I struggled with whether I should put their names on my list. What it came down to was do I interact with these people enough that God could use me in their lives at all (like I am so important). It felt like a bit of a cop out to finally choose them. It seemed like their names needed to be there though, so I wrote them down.
That same afternoon I ran into one of these people for the first time in months. He came to me and he is the one who initiated the conversation. It was the longest conversation I’ve had with him in the two years I’ve known him. I have trouble understanding him sometimes and I feel badly about it but on this particular afternoon, I understood every word clearly and easily and our conversation was enjoyable, humorous and flowed easily. We didn’t talk about God. He didn’t fall to his knees and cry out to Jesus (!). But, I was keenly aware that earlier that same day I’d just written this man’s name down on my “God please intercept these people miraculously and mightily” list.
I’m relatively convinced it was all a set up. God set me up just so he could show off.
“It ain’t about you my dear girl, but watch this!”
More of the same, please. I like it.
