Fishing
Welcome to Saturday Stories, a weekly break from the Scripture based devotional. These are stories from life, sometimes they have a point, and sometimes they are just stories. Either way, I hope you enjoy today’s Saturday Story.
I once was the pastor of Pleasant Hope Baptist Church, a small rural church in Mayes County, Oklahoma. During our almost seven years there, we lived in the church parsonage that is on the corner of the church property next to West 370 Road, not far from Bitter Creek. Back then homeschooling was novel and generally thought of as “weird.” To head off unnecessary debate about the subject we decided to name our home school “Bitter Creek Christian School,” as a nod to the creek near home and as our stock answer when asked what school the boys attended.
It was a good place to live. Our nearest neighbors were Web and Bessie Rix. You could see their house from our front porch. By that I mean I couldn’t hit it with a rock with my best throw on my best day, but it was visible. The church property, other than the church building itself, consisted of a large field directly in front of our front yard across the church driveway with backstop setup for the occasional softball game, and a cemetery out behind the church which we took on the job of mowing during the summer months.
Behind us was lots of unused land. The couple who owned it had inherited it and lived out of state at the time. On land on the other side of 370 road belonged to Web Rix. he an cattle on it. Near the fence line was a nice little pond with an embankment on the east side and a slough on the west. A large willow tree had grown up out of the embankment and its branches hung out over the waters of the pond providing heat relief and food for the perch that liked to congregate under its shade.
Web was kind enough to give me permission to fish in his pond. I agreed not to overdo it. I rarely kept what I caught. One afternoon I told Daniel, my second son, that I would take him fishing in Web’s pond. He was only four or five at the time, so I knew that my role was going to be limited to helping him bait his line and get it in the water. To ensure success for him, I grabbed a can of corn and a few perch hooks and headed to the willow tree where I knew we would catch some perch.
I would put some corn on a hook, drop the line in the water under the willow tree, hook a perch, and hand the fishing rod to Daniel so he could reel the fish in. After getting the fish off the hook and allowing Daniel to release it back into the water, I would repeat the process all over again.
We had done this routine about ten times when Daniel looked up at me and said, “I’m catching all the fish and you ain’t catchin nothin!”
I’ve though about that several time over the years. First, it was really funny. Second, I wonder if that is how we act toward God concerning our achievements in life?
