April 25, 2017
Luke
10:19
King James Version (KJV)
19 Behold, I give unto you
power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy:
and nothing shall by any means hurt you.
Thirty or more years ago when we were searching for a home
near La Sierra University, we spelled out several criteria. We wanted a home
near enough for me to walk to work. It had to have four bedrooms, one for us,
one for our boy and one for our girls, and one for a guest room especially for
grandparents. We hoped it would have a swimming pool so we could keep an eye on
what our kids and their friends were doing. We also hoped it would have access
to countryside where we could walk for recreation. Of course, it also had to be
in our price range.
The home we got couldn’t have matched these criteria any
better. Its selling point to me was that it was situated in a little valley
with desert hills on three sides. We could walk up into the hills by simply
walking past three houses, and we were into the hills. During a normal year the
hills turn a rich green color in the winter rains. For spring, summer and fall
the hills are the color of dried grass.
Almost every day over the last 30 odd years we have walked
at least some distance up into the hills, usually with a dog at our heels or
galloping merrily ahead. The dog’s favorite pastime is chasing, unsuccessfully,
every lizard that makes a mad dash to get out of our way. Occasionally it would
be a bird, ground squirrel or rabbit. Even more rarely, there would be a lone coyote
or as many as four or five them to give us a short thrill of the chase.
Sylvia and I have delighted ourselves in counting the number
of species of flowers actually blooming on a particular walk. Usually we count
anywhere between a dozen and two dozen species. During spring after the hills
have turned brown, we find the richest number of flower species. The other day
we had counted over 40 species and were at the very top of our La Sierra range
and heading home down a very rough trail.
As I walked I suddenly felt something soft under my right
foot, not the usual rock hard surface. In the shortest of moments, far shorter
than it takes to think it, let alone write it, I shifted the weight off my
right foot and made a lunge for Sylvia. I grabbed her by her waist and pushed
her backwards and away. I guessed it might have been a snake I had stepped on
and didn’t want her to be bitten. She thought I had lost my balance, which I have
been doing since my bout with West Nile Virus, and fought to keep me upright.
Neither of us fell, and I swung around to see what I had stepped on.
Right where my foot had trod a thick red western diamond
backed rattlesnake was slithering slowly away from us. It hadn’t so much as
tried to rattle and warn us. It had also not bitten me. I don’t know whether it
had tried or not. I was wearing heavy jeans and thick leather shoes, so it
might have tried but failed to penetrate to the skin. Furthermore, red western
diamond backs are known to be reticent to bite unless directly attacked. But I
do feel that I was under the direct protection of the Lord. In the words of
Christ in the next verse:
"Notwithstanding in this rejoice not, that
the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice, because your names are
written in heaven." Thank You, Heavenly Father!
Praise the Lord. I hope they never develop in the area behind your street. When we lived up there I loved walking in the hills, in the valley really behind your street. It always seems to me like I was going back in time before this area was developed. In our earlier years walking the hills, we also came across rattlers, but got sufficient warning to avoid them.
ReplyDeleteSylvia said to me after the excitement calmed down. You know that is only the fourth rattler we've seen in these hills in over 30 years.
ReplyDeleteThe hills are much safer than those we used to hike in, in Africa. We saw quite a number of cobras and puff-adders there. Both types are very deadly. I had a spitting-cobra (ringhals) cover both lenses of my glasses with venom that burnt like fire when it dripped off my glasses and onto my cheeks. That particular ringhals never spat again. It had been crawling towards a couple young children when I saw it. That was in the Copperbelt in Zambia.
God is good!