SLASH AND BURN
SOUL SEARCHING
Eight count em' eight fires -- that's what I tallied during my 12 km (8 mile) trip to St. George a few days ago. In the past couple of weeks I've seen the fire truck go by almost every day. Last night alone three fire trucks went down our road. What's going on you ask? Is it anarchy? Is there rioting in the streets accompanied by mass bonfires of protest against some social ill? No, it's just Spring in Charlotte County
Spring in Charlotte County means that you burn all your dead grass. Now, I've been places where a few people go through this ritual every Spring, but in Charlotte County we're talking a amazingly impressive participation rate! There will be fires everywhere for the next couple of weeks until every blade of the brown stuff is ash! Already our landscape looks a lot like Dallas after the Meteors hit (if you saw that mini series). Big patches of black are everywhere sticking out like testimonial stones to last years growth.
I remember coming home from Saint John late one evening last year and having to drive the last couple of miles through ominous smoke filled roads that were lined by an erie orange glow. I felt like I was driving through a war zone, but we all got home safely anyway.
The question is, what's behind all this burning? Is there a genetic predisposition to arson? No, not at all, everyone's just burning the dead stuff so that the green stuff will appear that much sooner. And not only will it appear that much sooner, it will appear that much greener (or so they tell me). I see such goings on as a rather understandable attempt at burying the Winter and giving the new life of Spring a foot up. When you only have a few months of Summer like we do in our part of the world, such rituals are necessary to keep our sanity!
But then I started to think about the fires and what they represent. They're an attempt at removing the dead in order to make room for the living. It's a way of purifying the land and preparing it for new life. And I thought you know what, we need to do the same thing with our hearts every once and a while. We need to ask God to set a fire and test the contents of our hearts and burn out those things that are dead and unfruitful so that there will be more room for life and growth.
That's what David prays toward the end of his life in Psalms 139:23-24, "Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting." The word translated "test" is a word that was used to check the purity of metals like gold or silver, by means of fire. So David is saying, "look into my heart Lord, root around, and see what needs to be burned to make sure that I have a pure, life giving heart that will promote growth. Do what you can Lord to ensure that I'm on the everlasting road."
Not a bad prayer! It's prayers like this that made David a man after the Lord's own heart even though he wasn't perfect by any stretch of the imagination! The bottom line is, we have to be diligent at regularly cleaning house. We have to get out there and burn away the dead stuff that accumulates in our hearts so that we have room for life, growth, and fruit.
Jesus told the disciples in John 15:1-2, "I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful." The question I leave with you to kick around this week is, what needs to be pruned in your life to make it more fruitful? What patches of grass need to be set on fire so that your faith can be flamed into a healthy life-giving glow? Ask the Lord to "test your heart." Invite him to do some Spring-time pruning. Perhaps that's all you need to get some new growth happening!
