Monday Memory

Where shall I start? Perhaps with some of my earliest memories. We lived in upstate NY...you know, not the city. We had a few acres, lots of woods, a garden, etc. It was a great place to play and build tree forts. Of course, I was too little for building, but I tagged along with my siblings when I could. We had two or three tree swings--one hung from a great big tree by our house, one from another big tree out back (which I think eventually got cut down), and another in the woods on a sloping tree, which my siblings liked to jump out of while sitting on the swing seat. I was too scared to try it.

Anyway, I remember one day hearing the far-off howling and yelping of beagles. Maybe I was a timid child, but the sound echoed and haunted and chilled me. I sat wide-eyed on a folding chair. Perhaps we were picnicking in the woods or just sitting. Would the dogs get me?

Another time, nearer our house, I believe, I heard a dog barking, and perhaps saw it, too. A big, black menacing dog, or at least so my imagination went. We did have one like that cross our yard on occasion, I think. Sitting on the swing near our house, I hastily climbed up the rope which had several knots in it and a second seat above. I sat up there, only feeling safe when I pulled the bottom rope and seat up around me, out of reach of any dogs.

Children tend to exaggerate things in their minds, to feel things more deeply and personally. We should be careful what children hear and how we explain things to them. And in some ways we should be more like children. To simply trust in Jesus to save us from the dogs that may howl about us, clinging to Him like a rope, though He is stronger than any rope man can make.

'And Jesus called a little child unto him, and set him in the midst of them,
And said, Verily I say unto you, Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven.' - Matthew 18:2-4