I got back from camping a few hours ago, and one of the things I learned is the importance of bringing fire, and I mean a very sure way of making as much fire as you're going to need. In out-in-the-woods camping, this isn't difficult because you can usually gather all the firewood you need and you can start it easily. This campout, however, was a backyard campout - no firewood. In planning the trip, we made sure that we'd have access to a grill, and I assumed that included fuel and a way to light the fuel. I assumed wrong. While use the grill included access to charcoal, I found that I was unable to light it. I tried using a magnesium bar, but all I could make with it was sparks. We obtained some matches that I had failed to pack, but even lit matches weren't enough to light the charcoal. In the end, we needed to buy lighter fluid before we had any chance at all of lighting the grill and cooking our hamburgers.
I thought I had been prepared for the camp out, but it ended up being a strong learning experience that required outside help to be successful. The analogy here is fairly plain.
I'm sure we prepared, in the pre-mortal existence, for our mortal lives down here. We may have thought that we knew what we were doing. There may have been a point where we felt ready to tackle the challenges of life. If so, I'm guessing that we were probably wrong. Life carries burdens and challenges that we could not even have imagined, let alone prepared for. Fortunately, we have access to outside help.
God knows what all the challenges of life are (having faced them Himself once), and He knows what faculties we need to get through them. He knows whether or not we're prepared to face the challenges on our own, and when we're not, He's prepared to make up the difference when we ask Him to.
It's comforting to know that even when our hopes and plans are falling apart, we can ask God for outside help, and with His help we can do things that we couldn't do on our own. He's watching out for us, and unlike ours, His plans never fail.
1 comment:
Another good analogy.
Note on campfires - many places where one camps it is illegal to gather firewood. One can imagine what would happen to the ecosystem if every camper collected firewood! The forest floor would be unable to replenish itself. In some areas one can bring in wood, but in many that practice is discouraged so as to prevent disease or investation. "Buy it where you burn it" is a common slogan. Purchasing from local rangers or places to which they direct you is usually the best. Really it is not a scheme for them to make money. It is to protect the local forests.
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