A fable.....fearfully and wonderfully...

A man walking through the forest saw a fox that had lost its legs and wondered how it lived. Then he saw a tiger come in with game in its mouth. The tiger had its fill and left the rest of the meat for the fox.

The next day God fed the fox by means of the same tiger. The man began to wonder at God's greatness and said to himself, "I too shall just rest in a corner with full trust in the Lord and he will provide me with all I need."

He did this for many days but nothing happened, and he was almost at death's door when he heard a voice say, "O you who are in the path of error, open your eyes to the truth! Follow the example of the tiger and stop imitating the disabled fox."

There are human beings who have come into our lives, into our consciousness who have made us question why God permits their suffering. Their painful struggles make us ask big questions about whether or not He really exists and why He would allow such grief. We ask....

"Why would You permit this?"

"Why aren't You doing something about this person's suffering?"

So we pray.....that's what we're supposed to do.....the motions of prayer.

Perhaps in our prayers, we point out this suffering human being to God........we say........."Please look after this person who has too many burdens to carry themselves. Do something please God."

We stay busy in our lives, feeling good that we have identified this person to God. We've done our work. We've passed the buck onto the Almighty's bank of woes and we don't have to think about it again.

Then one night, sleep doesn't come easy. Restlessness and discomfort seep into our legs, and makes our stomachs queasy, and forces us out of bed and into the dark silence......silence sliced with crashing echoes of waves along a shore, or winds brushing leaves......silence so loud despite the quiet setting we find ourselves in. We can't escape it. We try to calm the inner turmoil........the incessant noise filling the internal spaces. We begin by focusing on taking deep breaths.......slow deep breaths which somehow begin to open gaps in between the noise, allowing ourselves to go beyond the listening of the silence. Small slivers of space begin to emerge where the ear drumming used to be.

The uncomfortable feelings continue to panic.......discomfort grows, so we do what we can to push it away by continuing to peel away the loud anxious silence. We inhale slow deep breaths of oxygen to calm the waves, until at last we begin to feel an undressing of the ego. Soon, vocalized words are replaced by the reverence of humility.

Suddenly through a wild eye opening in the silence, we hear the clear whisperered message.....

"I did do something...........I made you."