May I correct the title of the story I began to blog yesterday? It is HINDS FEET ON HIGH PLACES, and not FOR Highplaces. I believe I mis-wrote the title yesterday. And now, getting on with the story.....Much-Afraid, the young woman, is like many of us as we are just coming into adulthood; we are afraid. But Much-afraid came from a whole family and neighborhood of fearful people who relished the unsettling things of life that most families would try to avoid. And after Much-Afraid met the Shepherd, she began to feel Love for the first time, and it transformed her for the Shepherd granted her request to know Love and planted a seed within her that, perhaps one day, would become Love in its finest way. However, the planted seed would cause her to feel pain, because as she learned to Love, she would feel the pain that loving often brings. Much-Afraid also learned that if she got to the top of the mountain, she would also get a new name, and she cherished that idea.
Now, the Shepherd asked, "Are you still willing to be changed completely, and to be made like the new name which you will receive if you become a citizen in the Kingdom of Love?" She answered, "Yes, yet I do fear that if I really love someone, I will give that person I love the power to hurt me like nothing else can." "That is true," agreed the Shepherd. "To love does mean to put yourself into the power of the loved one and to become very vulnerable to pain. And you are very Much-Afraid of pain, aren't you?" She felt miserable, and said with shame, "Yes. I am very much afraid of pain," and her head bowed low. "But, it is so happy to love!" said the Shepherd quietly and added, "It is happy to love even if you are not loved in return. And Love does not think pain is very significant."
At that, Much-Afraid thought suddenly that the Shepherd had the most patient eyes she had ever seen.Yet there was something still that she wondered, Could she be sure she would be loved in return? And the Shepherd said without hesitation, "I promise you, Much-Afraid, that when the plant of Love is ready to bloom in your heart and when you are ready to change your name, then you will be loved in return."
He looked very kindly at the little one anxious to be a shepherdess who had been "planted" with the seed of Love and was preparing to go to the High Places. He knew her thoroughly, far better than she knew herself. No one understood better than he, that growing into the likeness of a new name is a long process. But he looked at her with tender pity and compassion and saw her glowing cheeks and shining eyes which had transformed the appearance of plain little Much-Afraid. And they arranged the time that they could start for the mountain.
On her way back to her little cottage, Much-Afraid was accosted by Craven Fear. Her face became white and her eyes were terrified which stimulated Craven's desire to bait her. She was alone, and in his power. But the Shepherd approached just then and was standing beside them. One look at his stern face and flashing eyes and the stout Shepherd's cudgel grasped in his strong uplifted hand, and the bully slunk away like a whipped cur, actually running from the village.
Much-Afraid burst into tears. She was overwhelmed with shame that she had so quickly acted like her old name and nature, which she had hoped was beginning to be changed already. It seemed it would be impossible to ignore the Fearings People, still less to resist them. Would she never be able to be all that the Shepherd wanted her to be?
And then she remembered, with a thrill of wonder, that the seed of Love had been planted in her heart. And she knew delight, a bittersweet, indefinable but wholly delightful ecstasy of a new happiness. and said, "It is happy to love!" And there in her cottage and in her bed, before she fell asleep, she sang an old song, ending with the words, "And be to me, As I to thee, Sweet Company. And she fell into a heavy, dreamless sleep, happily waiting until the morrow.
Tomorrow? To the mountain. "Be to me, as I to thee, Sweet Company!"
Jo INMN
No comments:
Post a Comment