When I was about 15 years old I was not a great kid. Some called it mischief. Some called it three felonies. Depends on who you ask. 🙂
After getting caught me and my friend Steve had already agreed that if we got sent away to the detention center for boys, we were running away. Bags were packed and hidden in the woods. No way we were getting sent to that place.
I will never forget standing before the judge at 15 years old and him sentencing me to 2 years in the Booneville MO detention center for boys. And just before he hit the gavel he said, “To be served upon violation of your probation”. That was close.
No matter what you call it, one thing was certain, at 12 years old a couple of events happened that blinded me. Set me on a string of “mischief”. I was flying blind.
One time I went spelunking, we all got to the center of the cave and it was a massive cavern that had lights installed. Beautiful. Then the guide turned off all the lights. I’ve never seen such darkness. “seen darkness”…even as I typed that I knew it didn’t sound right. The darkness was pure and my eyes strained and strained to see anything at all. Nothing. Completely blind. Actual and odd fear.
The guide then started to give instructions on where to walk. We walked but it was VERY slowly and with unsteady steps. Then…the guide took me by the arm and guided me. He knew the environment, he’d been there dozens of times and while he couldn’t see, he knew where to go. I wonder if this is what Jesus meant when he talked about praying for someone that’s hungry. He said to give the hungry person food, not just prayer.
Recently the world got dark. I was flying blind. Some folks took me by the arm and guided me through it. Not instruction from a distance, actual guiding and walking me through it.
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