There is much good in an allegorical story; there is much to remember and much to pray about. No allegory can duplicate exactly what our own Lord tells us. What God wants of us, primarily, is to want Him above all else and to follow Him in our lives. If Much-Afraid helped us in any way to do that, I am glad. By tomorrow, the story HINDS FEET IN HIGH PLACES should be finished. Our own stories, perhaps, just beginning. Let's see what is to happen to Much-Afraid next.
Much Afraid has just a wakened with the sun high in the sky. She looked out through the mouth of a cave in which she found herself. She lay a little longer, collecting her thoughts, remembering. She had come to a cloud-filled canyon high on the mountains and found an altar for sacrifice. She had tried to rid herself of human love, but ultimately it was removed by some power other than herself. She pulled a cloth aside which covered her, and saw no wound, not even a scar. She rose quietly and stood still, looking about her. The canyon now shimmered in sunlight. The grass, soft and richly green, grew everywhere, starred with gentians and other little flowerlets. Below her, she saw a long stone altar, and she guessed it was where she had lain. Her heart leaped and thrilled with joy which was beyond her understanding and a peace, incredibly sweet, enfolded her. She was quite alone. There were no signs of her companions, Sorrow and Suffering. The only things that breathed, beside herself, were the cheerful little birds that fluttered through the flowers and the cloudless sky. And there she stayed in peace for the long, quiet day.
Early on the morning of a soon to follow day, she woke. It was still dark, but she sprang to her feet with a shock of joy. She had not heard a voice, but she knew that she had been called by a mysterious, sweet summons, a summons she had been waiting for. Yet all the sound she heard was the waterfall. Then again, she felt a tingling--a call from some high place and she looked eagerly around. Her feet and legs began to tingle, as if they desired to go bounding up the mountain, but she found no possible means of exit. Then, as she stood straining every nerve, up from a mossy bank sprang a mountain goat with his hind close behind. The hart sprang on the altar rock, and from there leaped a projecting ledge of the wall on the farther side of the ravine. Closely following was his hind.
Much-Afraid did not hesitate, but followed with a flying leap. She reached the ledge and using the same footholds as the hart and the hind, she leapt and sprung in perfect ecstasy, following them up the cliff, the hooves of the deer ringing on the rocks before her like little silver hammers. She skipped and jumped from rock to rock excitedly as the first sunbeams streamed over the mountaintop. And, at last, there He was, standing on the peak, just as she had known he would be, strong and grand and glorious in the beauty of the sunrise, holding out both hands and calling to her with a great laugh, "You--with the hinds' feet--jump over here!"
She gave one last flying spring, caught his hands and landed beside him on the top-most peak of the mountain. Around them in every direction towered other and greater ranges of snow mountains whose summits soared into the sky higher than her sight could follow them. He was crowned and dressed in royal robes just as she knew he would be.
Then he went on. "Now for the flower of Love and the promise that when it blooms you will be loved in return." But Much Afraid, now being called Grace and Glory, spoke for the first time. "My Lord and King," she said softly, "There is no flower of Love to bloom in my heart. It was burned to ashes on the altar at your command." But he laughed gently and joyfully. "That is strange. How then did you get here? You are on the High Places, in the Kingdom of Love. Your heart will tell us what is there!" At His word she laid bare her heart and out came the sweetest perfume. And there in her heart was a growing plant, covered all over with pure white, blooms. When she asked how it could have gotten there, the Lord replied, "Why, I planted it myself. It is the flower from the thorn-shaped seed. You had a desire for human love which was torn out of your heart; this love is lasting love, the real Love." He bowed his head and she took his hands in hers,, her scarred hands which had sown the thorn-shaped seed in her heart, and the hands with the grasp of iron which had torn out the human love from her heart. And He kissed her hands, the hands that He loved and had sacrificed so much for Him. ( The story for today.)
This must seem strange, or stranger than ever. The allegory spells out what we each are asked to do. Replace the need for wanting, whether it's human love like the movies show us, or love of being right, or important, or a winner. Human needs way outnumber spiritual needs. For if we have God in our hearts, trusting God, seeking God, knowing God, honoring God we don't need human attention. Honoring God, (we shall see tomorrow) we will put ourselves second, before Him, and in that way honor and give to those in humankind, in God's name.
I hope you and I are getting it...Really getting it!
Jo INMN
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