I am what some people might call a reformed city girl. More accurately, I am a reforming (almost) country girl. In saying this I do not mean insult the city or suburban lifestyle. By "reforming" I mean that I personally am becoming more accustomed to and appreciative of a different, slower paced approach to living.
After spending most of my life residing within metropolitan areas with populations ranging from 100,000 to the millions, a little over two years ago I moved to a small town in southwestern New York State with a population of just under 500 people. What Panama, NY lacks in people, it seems to make up for in animals... all kinds of animals. For example my daughter's good friend lives on a property with multiple dogs, cats, chickens, roosters, pigs, sheep and horses, though the young lady assures me that they do not live on a farm. Never in my life would I have imagined any child of mine asking permission to go to her friends house so that she could help walk the pigs.
Some of these creatures, both domestic and wild, have challenged my ability to adjust to the rural environment. It used to terrify me when my neighbors' multiple unleashed dogs would run towards me barking forcefully as I went on walks down the road. In the city that's a good reason to detour down another side road (which come in short supply in the country), ready the mace or call animal control. Most in the time in the country they are just coming out to say hello. One dog's "hello" bark actually intimidated me so much that I held out my thumb and hitch-hiked for the only time in my life, for about a mile, just to get myself past that animal's property.
Then there is the livestock. The people who lived two doors up from our first country residence had cows that would frequently escape from the pen. One even managed to cross the street one day. As I began my morning walk, I noticed her eyes staring me down, daring me to cross her path. I did not have the nerve to take the dare. Instead I quickly walked back to another neighbor's house (the neighbors who did not own the cattle), opened the door without even knocking and said "I'm sorry to bother you, but we have a cow situation." When they stopped laughing at me, they just shook their head and said "city girl."
One Sunday morning we were unable to get to church in time to fulfill our duty as greeters, due to a "home visit" from some of these same cattle. Three of them had gotten out of the pen and stood between our house and our car. One cow stood less then six inches from our front door and just stared into our living room. Imagine having to text a pastor with this excuse like this: "I'm sorry we cannot make it in time to greet this morning. We've been cowed in."
The wild animals present a scarier problem. What few black bears reside in the area tend to avoid humans as much as possible. The only real dangers would come if the got spooked or cornered or if one meddled with their cubs or food supply. And coyotes usually only come out at night, almost always where there are no big light or groups of people. Still, I must confess that after sunset I stayed in the house as mush as possible and cultivated a much more active prayer life during those short trips from the front door to the car or the compost pile.
But the scariest experience I had with country animals came a few weeks ago... in the form of three field mice. Believe me, I know how crazy that sounds. But here's the difference. The other animals lurked around in neighbors yards or local forests. Those three mice had gotten into my home.
I thought I had heard some feet scurrying around in the ceiling and walls, but after calling my landlord I was content to ignore it. We hear animals all of the time out here, and I reasoned that it might just be in my head. More importantly, my truck driving husband is on the road a lot. So acknowledging the presence of rodents in my home would mean that I alone would have to deal with the issue.
Then my daughter found a dead mouse somewhere near the garbage, on one of my sandals. I used to laugh at that old illustration of an elephant that showed terror and want into a frenzy over the presence of a mouse. I will never laugh at that elephant again. I am that elephant. I had such a hard time functioning over the thought of that tiny little deceased visitor that my poor thirteen year old daughter Ali actually had to take care of it for me. When she asked me to check my box of shoes to see if there were any more mice, my initial response was literally "I am never wearing shoes again." The next night I was briefly tempted to give up food as well when we saw two more field mice running across our kitchen floor. Never in my life have I felt more like a city girl.
The landlord told me that it is common for a few field mice to get into houses in this area around this time a year. He also said that all I needed to do to take care of it was set a few traps around the apartment and keep emptying and resetting them until there were no more mice. After two sleepless nights, we finally went into town to buy the traps. Ali found some easy, disposable traps that could not accidentally snap on my finger. These traps were designed to kill the mice without us ever having to see them, and they did their job the very night that we set them. We haven't seen a mouse in our house since, though we have more traps set just in case.
As much as it disturbed me, I am so very grateful to God that I saw those mice when I did. Ali was able to identify and plug a tiny hole in the bathroom through which the mice had probably entered the apartment, and we were able to take care of the problem fairly quickly. Had we not seen them, the mice may have gotten into the food supply, chewed up wires or gotten up into higher cabinets. Worse yet, if unchecked they may have reproduced and caused a real problem for us. Seeing the mice out in the open forced me to confront address the issue before it the mice got out of control and did more damage.
Trials have a way of exposing the "field mice" in our lives, those little hidden fears, hurts and weaknesses that lurk and move quietly through the walls of our soul. This can evoke all kinds of feeling that we do not want to have, everything from annoyance to complete brokenness. But in reality, becoming aware of our weaknesses can be a great blessing, because an awareness of our infirmaries can be the first step to healing.
In a sense too much worldly comfort (or more accurately, complacency) can be one of our greatest enemies, because it can suppress dangerous and destructive thoughts and emotions that we may not otherwise even know existed. And sometimes we have to see the problem right in front of us in order to address it.
King Solomon was wise enough to acknowledge that the people of Israel would make mistakes and do things that would both offend God and harm themselves. He knew that they would either ignore or be unaware of their sins for awhile, but that it would eventually bring them to a point of suffering that they knew could not solve. He asked that God would have mercy upon them when in their desperations they finally acknowledged the "mouse in the room." God's loving response to Solomon's prayer was this:
"If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sins and heal their land." (II Chronicles 7:14)
Think about it. Sicknesses are often healed when people discover a diagnosis, and thus know where to go for healing. When you know you have a leaking pipe, you can call the plumber to fix it. How wonderful it is when the mechanic finds the reason for that rattling in your car's engine, so that he or she knows exactly how to fix it.
Even more so than these, trials can be a blessing when they expose our sin, our unforgiveness, our confusions, weakness and past hurts. How else would we know to confess them, own them and bring them to the great physician for healing?
This will probably not be the last time we receive little unwanted visitors in our country home. And I am certain that God is far from done working on all of the unhealthy "visitors" of sin an weakness in my heart. I'll probably scream when I see another mouse some day, and I will not like the feeling of more exposed weakness in my life. But I am so very grateful that God's grace can move me beyond that "Eeek" moments when sin and trials are first revealed, onto true healing and growth.
Happy Easter, my friends.
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