Ensign: Greetings, Fellow Followers!
AN ENSIGN ON THE MOUNTAINS 22 July 2016
July 22, 1376.
Robert Browning's poem "The Pied Piper of Hamelin" cites this date along with most other poems, movies, etc. that retell or build on this legend as the day a brightly-dressed -- pied in this context means "multicolored" -- man came into Hamelin (today's Hameln in southern Germany) and, miffed that he hadn't been paid what he was promised by the mayor and the town council when he drove the rats out of town with his music, led the children out of town and at least in the poem, one child returned to tell of this beautiful land in Biblical terms that was flowing with milk and honey.
But on a kids' level.
One where you can have all the candy you want and not get sick and no animals can hurt you. On the six hundred fortieth anniversary of the Pied Piper and his leading children out of Hamelin and as I type this, I find myself thinking what a downer this story is. Even though the mayor and town council and I'd say the parents of Hamelin were by no means innocent -- I mean, they did hire the Piper to drive the rats, they should have paid him what they promised! Isn't the laborer worthy of his hire, I paraphrase 1 Timothy 5:18 here?
But kidnapping children?
Is that something we really want to commemorate, even in literature? (This is a story our children have very likely heard in some form; does it get us used to evil winning?) I don't think so. But you and I as parents -- and if you reading this are not a parent, think of anyone you care for, or even yourself -- know how hard it is, even when we bathe them or each other in prayer. We cannot be with them every second of every day; I think if we could, we would rightly earn their resentment. Because you and I have that annoying, grating tendency to judge (condemn) without having all the facts, Max.
That is God's job, not yours, and not mine.
Even though we who have read to the end of the book know -- and I'm speaking to the born-again Christian contingent of my reading audience, with "the book" being the Bible -- that we win ... it's at the end of the book. And may I go on record saying that the Bible is one book you DO NOT want to flip to the end and read that part first. Revelation's tough! Or skim, any more than I expect you and I are not in a rush to get to the ends of our lives. But there are pied pipers -- that's actually entered the language as a phrase -- for those who want to lead us away from the path we follow onto theirs.
Even you self-reliant types are following somebody.
And despite living in the end times now, what most Christians and even non-Christians if they're honest believe are leading to the end or at most a transformation of the world, there are days I find Jesus' return for us is dragging. I know I don't have God's timing in mind, I know I'm more interested in MY standard of justice being met -- which is a corrupted version of my Lord's because of that condemnation thing, I know that. That is when I and all of us can come back and ask as even Jesus did in Gethsemane, not my will but God's be done. Not to follow ourselves, but follow Him.
We need no pipes playing to follow that call,
David
P.S. I write this weekly devotional to keep in touch with you, and I hope it encourages us too! If it's not or you just want me to get lose, please let me know. Thank you!
Thank YOU, Lord, that we can come to you in prayer and that we can count on You to provide for all our needs, even when we don't know what they are. And let us come to You in prayer for the peace of Jerusalem on both sides of the fence and all over the world.
Thank You as well, Lord, for everyone in leadership and service both here and abroad. Thank You also for the opportunities we have and the promise of new life through You by Your Son Our Brother, Jesus Christ.
And I pray that we all seek and have a blessed week! Amen.
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