Hi, Peeplezs,
Down over the years I have experienced plenty of discouragement and cynicism about faith and the existence of a God who cares for us. If I allowed myself to dwell on those things alone, I suppose that I too would be feeling hopeless and cynical and would be just waiting until my time is up.
However, I don't feel that way at all. I'd like to tell you just one of the reasons why. You probably get emails like I do showing the wonders of the natural world, but I feel that I have seen such beauty in nature that I can't bring myself to doubt that there is a Creator that loves us. What most people forget is that we are part of that nature too.
To that end, I would like to recount something that I became aware of some years ago, but only lately learned the details behind. It left me with my mouth hanging open in astonishment and is in my mind, a candidate for the record book. Moreover, and even more astonishing, it happened right here in my own family.
A little background first, though. We married very young. I was 20, and she was 15. One of my primary goals when I married this little freckle-faced girl was to do all I knew how to be sure that she could find joy and happiness in her role of wife and mother. I wanted her to be glad she was a woman (especially my woman) and found fulfillment in her role in life. Needless to say, that is not something that a man can force on a woman, and for it to happen he has to control the environment in such a way that those qualities can grow on their own. I compared it to planting a garden. All one can do is plant the seeds, cultivate them, water them, make sure the ground has the nutrients needed, and the proper amount of sunlight is available. God will do the rest.
She blossomed far beyond anything that I expected, and I was enthralled with the results. Everyone that knows her loves her. We will be celebrating our 51 st wedding anniversary next month and look forward to many more.
We soon had five daughters who had the potential of becoming the same thing she was. The way that women have been reduced to second class citizens and taken advantage of down over the years has always grieved me. Therefore I tried my best to give them not only the knowledge of what they were, but a respect and appreciation for how they were created. That meant giving them a knowledge and understanding of the entire process.
They understood the monthly menses and their purpose just as soon as they were old enough to comprehend, and in fact, I still laugh about one occurrence that happened when the oldest were only two and three years old. They came in the house one hot summer afternoon in Southern California and ran up to the arm of the recliner where I was sipping a glass of ice water and reading the newspaper, while trying to cool down after a hot day's work. "Daddy, will you tell us about the birds and the bees?"
Startled, for I was wondering where they had heard the term, I picked them up, sat them in my lap, and gave them a general run-down on where they came from. They were fascinated and had many questions, but after a time they became satisfied and ran back out to play.
A week later, in exactly the same setting, they ran in again. "Daddy, will you tell us about the birds and the bees?"
I did a double take. "I did!" I exclaimed.
"No, Daddy. You told us about people. We want to know about the birds and the bees!"
I figured the best way for them to find joy and fulfillment in how they were created would be to show them the beauty and wonder there is in nature, and then help them to realize that they too were a part of that same nature. I think it worked. One big way it helped is that there are very few subjects that we can't speak about in an open and honest manner, even today.
Our fourth daughter Jeanne (Pony's wife) seemed to take this to heart as much or more as the others. She has always loved nature in all of its manifestations, so much so that her Grandfather had a fit when he caught her hand-feeding wild skunks in his basement! LOL!! She would just glow whenever I called her "My Little Wood Nymph".
Marrying an Apache Indian seemed a perfect fit, and she took to the culture like a duck to water. I went to one Powwow where Pony was teaching the newcomers about many of the Indian customs and ways of doing things. He turned to Jeanne and asked her to demonstrate how to make fire without matches. She cheerfully agreed and reached for her fire making equipment (a straight rod and the bow and string to spin it with, plus the tinder for the spark to land in) and knelt down in front of everyone so that they could see. There must have been 50 people there, all craning their necks in fascination.
What she hadn't counted on were her kids (3 at the time) who were 2, 3, and 7 years old. They knew exactly what she was going to do, and they were going to help! Their unbridled enthusiasm and the resulting chaos were simply hilarious! I think she could have done it in 30 seconds, but with all their "help" it took about 5 minutes, even with Pony grabbing the youngest at about the 4 minute mark. We all had belly aches and tears running down our cheeks from laughing so hard!
I recount this, as it will throw some light on the mindset behind this tale. I'll let their oldest son, Sol, tell it. He was 2 at the time and remembers it well. In fact, the following is the report he wrote this last school year. He is 10 now.
My "Deer" Brother
My name is Sol and I have a very special relationship with the deer. How is this so you may ask? Well it all started on June of 2002. [I was only two years old]. Me and my mom were on a hike when we noticed a strange lump on the ground, why it was a baby deer! My mom carefully picked it up. When she held it in her arms it was smaller than a loaf of bread.
After we brought it home we offered it some water, but it would not drink. Then my mom went out of the room to make some calls. When she came back we went to the store and bought a bottle and some kitten formula. My mom tried to feed it but it still would not eat. My mom then called some more people to see if they would help. After no luck we put the deer in the garden to see if it would eat the plants in it.
It still would not stand, it just curled up in the corner and stayed there for a long time. It broke are heart to see such a cute little child so weak. Me and my mom were in the garden watching it when I wanted to nurse. My mom lifted up her shirt and I clutched on to her breast. The deer suddenly sprang to life. It started to run towards us and then it started to head butt me and scratch me with its hooves.
Without thinking twice my mom lifted up the other side of her shirt and before I could start crying the deer latched on. Now, because I have nursed with the deer, I am his brother. This to me is a very special privilege and I am very proud of it.
Sol Howell-Gilbert, age 10
It was through Sol's report that I learned some of the details. What surprised me so much was that the fawn would recognize her as a source of food and would be willing to fight for it. Therefore, when the family came over a few days later, I asked Jeanne about some of the details.
For instance, did the fawn really react so quickly? Her eyes got big. "Yes!" It was so fast that I couldn't react quickly enough to stop it!" Part of that was because she was frozen in surprise for a second or two, but was immediately galvanized into action due to the need to protect Sol. Even then, she was stunned at what was happening, and could only react by instinct. "Wait!" She cried out. "I have two of them!" She quickly lifted the other side of her shirt. The fawn took it without hesitation.
"But didn't it hurt?" I asked.
A tender look crossed her face and her eyes got soft. "No. Its sucking was strong, yes, but it was about the same as a baby. It didn't even try to bite." She hesitated, then continued, "The only thing that was uncomfortable was that while it was definitely hungry and wanted food, it was still scared of me. Therefore after it latched on, it would back off as far as it could get without losing its grip. That stretched my breast out a little too much. I put my left arm around it and pulled it closer so that it wouldn't be uncomfortable."
She was silent for a few seconds, smiling at the memory, then continued. "I was sitting with my back to the fence while this was happening and I couldn't move. I remember hoping that someone would look over it and see what was going on, so that I would have a witness to the fact that this actually happened."
A lady from Wild Animal Rescue showed up a few hours later. She was really concerned because many people who find fawns try to feed them, and as many times as not they feed them something that makes them sick or worse, so she carefully questioned Jeanne about that. At first, Jeanne was a little embarrassed about telling her, but when it came out, the lady was thrilled and excited.
Who would have ever imagined that a fawn would react so instantly and emphatically to the sight of a human mother nursing her child? It simply blew my mind, but it raised a couple of huge questions too. How little we know. The scripture at Isaiah 11:6-9 is beautiful, but it's like an impossible dream that could never occur:
"And the wolf will actually reside for a while with the male lamb, and with the kid the leopard itself will lie down, and the calf and the maned young lion and the well-fed animal all together, and a mere little boy will be leader over them. And the cow and the bear themselves will feed; together their young ones will lie down. And even the lion will eat straw just like the bull. And the sucking child will certainly play upon the hole of the cobra, and upon the light aperture of a poisonous snake will a weaned child actually put his own hand. They will not do any harm or cause any ruin in all my holy mountain; because the earth will certainly be filled with the knowledge of Jehovah as the waters are covering the very sea."
But, we see things like what happened above, and look at the startling harmony that can exist between species as is passed around in emails, and view videos that would be laughable if they weren't recorded for us to see, like these three:
a. Last week there was an article on a man in the far north who lives with, plays with and even wrestles wolverines. They are his pets.
b. The man in Venezuela (as I remember) who found a young injured crocodile and nursed it back to health, and it has been his pet ever since. It is now huge, yet he swims, wrestles, and rides on its back in the river where it lives. He even sticks his head in its mouth.
c. The young boy of about 10 in Burma, whose pet snake is a python about 20 ft. long. It runs loose in the house and is so huge that the boy will lie down on its back and ride around on it.
And we wonder - is that scripture really all that far-fetched?
In turn, that raises a second question. How much have the rest of the living things here on the earth suffered because Satan decided to deprive us of the knowledge of how to obey the original commandment: "Further, God blessed them and God said to them: 'Be fruitful and become many and fill the earth and subdue it, and have in subjection the fish of the sea and the flying creatures of the heavens and every living creature that is moving upon the earth.'" (Genesis 1:28)?
I would suspect that last sentence in Isaiah 11:9 has special meaning for them.
I have seen many things like this, so the real question is how could I NOT believe in and love a God who would create such beautiful things? I am grateful beyond words just for the privilege to live on the same planet with these exquisite creatures, and women lead that list.
Tom