Sitting here in this rocking chair, enjoying a beautiful day like today, allows a man’s mind to wonder. I can’t help be remember a very similar setting. In fact, except for the location, it was much like today. Let me share the story with you, if that is alright?
I was sitting in this same old rocking chair, enjoying a beautiful day. There was a slight breeze, gently blowing, keeping the air fresh and clean. Man’s best friend was laying along side the chair with an occasional slow brush of his tail on the porch deck and a flicker of an eye when the rocking chair would squeak. Oh this is the life, I thought! My, how good it feels to be able to relax and enjoy some quiet time.
The boys and the hands were all out working taking care of things. The boys were finally old enough and had enough experience they were able to pretty much run things around the place. All I had to do was just overseeing everything and some times play referee. This was the life I had worked for all of these years. Perfect!
The serenity of the afternoon was shattered by the clamor of hooves on the hard pack dirt of the yard. Angry shouts were intermingled with excited voices clamoring to be heard. I could hear the boys loudly exclaiming, “You tell him!” This was rapidly followed by, “No, you tell him!” Well, so much for peace and quiet.
I arose from my chair and stepped around the corner of the house to find most of my sons gathered in the yard. They were heatedly trying to determine who would approach me with whatever bad news they needed to tell me. It reminded me of when they were young boys and would argue over who told me they had somehow broken something they shouldn’t have been playing with in the first place. I had to ask myself the question, “Will they ever change?”
As I approached, the group slowly opened up as the boys began to step back. There in the hands of one of the boys was a coat. It didn’t take a second glance for me to recognize it. It was the coat I had just given their younger brother. Who, by now, I notice is not part of the group. My second look at the coat filled me with fear! Horror welled up within me! Sweat broke out on my forehead and my knees became weak. For a brief moment I was afraid I would fall, and then I quickly caught myself. Yes, it was just as I had first feared the coat was covered in blood.
The story was told to me in choked off sentences. I can see the fear and shame in the eyes of my sons as they admit to their failure to keep an eye on their younger brother in order to insure his safety. They recount to me how they noticed him to be missing and realized they had not seen him in a long time. When they searched for him, all they found was a coat covered in blood. What had transpired was obvious to all of us! He had wondered off alone and had been attacked by a wild animal. Oh, I couldn’t even begin to think of what happened after that.
My heart was broken! I was crushed! My son, whom I had loved so much, was dead. I clutched the coat, which was covered in dried blood, to my chest and began to weep wet bitter tears! I refused to be consoled! Every time I looked at the bloody coat my heart would once again break and I would again bury my face in it weeping with heart wrenching sobs!
As the days made the weeks and the weeks turned into months I continued to mourn for my son. Someone said that time heals all wounds but this was a wound time would never heal. The pain didn’t go away, it was just numbed. My only consolation was I had a son younger than the one lost and in him I placed my affection and protectiveness. I wouldn’t let him out of my sight. I refused the efforts of the older boys to take him to the fields with them so they could teach him to work. I refused to take a chance on losing this son as I had his older brother.
You can imagine how distraught I was, several years later, when the boys returned from a business trip. We had agreed on their need to go to the city and try to secure some help in order to keep the business going. Times were hard and things were looking bad. We needed all of the help we could get. However, upon their return they informed me the only way we would be able to get help was if they took their youngest brother back with them.
I was emphatic in my rejection of this absurd idea! How dare them to think I would agree. How dare the business executive they were dealing with to even suggest it? My heart was pounding in my chest! My pulse was racing! My eyes filled with tears which spilled down my old weathered cheeks as I pictured the blood stained coat I had wept over so many nights these past years. No! It wasn’t going to happen.
The boys hung their heads, shuffled their feet and muttered under their breaths. They were obvious in their discomfort. Once again I couldn’t help but be reminded of when they were young. There was little resemblance to the middle aged men they had become. They actually resembled a bunch of school boys being told they couldn’t play ball because of the window they had broken.
Finally one of them, probably the designated spokesman, explained there was no other option. They either took their youngest brother with them on their return or there was no deal. The executive they were dealing with had been adamant they were to bring their brother or no deal. He felt that he needed to talk to all of the brothers since they were all part of the deal.
After much heated discussion and almost accusing my sons of allowing their brother’s death I relented. I really didn’t have a choice. We were in a desperate situation. If it had just been me and the boys I would have held out, it would have never happened. However, the well being of my daughters in law and grandchildren were at risk as well. So I gave in with several warnings of what I would do if something happened to their youngest brother.
It wasn’t long until they returned with news. They had secured the help we needed. They, in fact, were able to secure an unlimited supply of help. However, the additional news they returned with was truly unbelievable. The man they had been working with trying to secure the help, the executive, was none other than my son who I thought was dead. He was alive and in a very prestigious and powerful position.
Well the true story came out! My older sons had been very jealous of my affection for their younger brother. When I had given him the beautiful coat they had decided to get rid of him. An opportunity had presented itself and they had been able to get rid of him. They had killed one of the goats, we had to eat the brush, and put its blood on the coat in order to make me think their brother had been killed. Now, many years later, here he was in a position to benefit his family.
As the rocking chair slowly rocks back and forth my mind replays all of these past events.
Apologies have been made and forgiveness has been given. This is a wound that time will heal. A small smile pulls at one corner of my mouth as I think of the irony of the situation. While I was weeping over goat’s blood, the answer to my prayer was on his way to the executive office. Isn’t God amazing?
As you might have recognized, this is the story of Jacob and Joseph. One amazing thing about that story, to me, is while Jacob wept over goat’s blood, the deliverer was on the way to the throne room. Storms in life will come, that is a given. What isn’t a given is how will we react to them. Will we trust God to have our best interests at heart? Will we hold to the core of the things we have hoped for, will we cling to them? Will we trust in that inner confirmation to those things we have yet to see? In spite of the storm believing God is doing what is right for us? Or will we weep over goat’s blood while the deliverer is on the way to the throne room?
Just a thought!
God Bless.
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