Lessons From a Chipmunk

 

The Reverend Ted Bass had a profound influence on my life.  He was my pastor at the Lynmore United Methodist Church in Macon when I received my call into the ministry.  He was also there for me at critical junctures in my life and in the life of my family.  I am quite certain that without his influence I never would have been able to discern that God was calling me to be a pastor in the United Methodist Church.

Ted developed a charecter for use in his Children’s Sermons named Charlie Chipmunk.  Charlie attended “The Little Brown Church in the Log” and his adventures and misadventures provided Ted with a great opportunity to share Christ centered lessons with his children.

Ted retired a number of years ago and passed away in March of 2020 prior to the shutdown due to the pandemic.  Yet, Charlie is still around.  Ted’s son-in-law, the Reverend Steve Keck, the pastor of the Broad Street United Methodist Church in Clinton, South Carolina still shares the stories of Charlie Chipmunk with his congregation.

Charlie Chipmunk sprang to mind recently when a chipmunk, whose name I did not get, revealed to me a great truth.

I was on my morning walk.  I had passed the halfway point of my route having turned and headed home.  Several yards in front of me sat a chipmunk.  When the chipmunk noticed me approaching, he/she, I did not get to make a gender identification of the chipmunk either, began sprinting down the sidewalk away from me in a frantic pace.

When the chipmunk realized I was still approaching, the critter darted into the grass between the sidewalk and the road.  Apparently,  I came to close to the its hiding place because the creature made a mad dash to the other side of the road. 

A Chevrolet of some description also happened to be coming over a hill at the same time the chipmunk entered the road. The vehicle never slowed and came within centimeters of creating a chipmunk pancake right in the middle of the street.  The rodent raced to the other side of the road where I assume safety was found.

After watching the incident I got a little philosophical.  I wondered “Why this chipmunk made it across the road while countless, squirrels, possums, dogs, skunks and cats don’t?”  I wondered if this was some sort of “special” chipmunk.  Such existential questions can be mind numbing and rarely produce any results of a pragmatic nature so I forgot about the chipmunk and finished my walk and went home and ate breakfast.

Yet, I passed the same spot the next day and the chipmunk came to mind.  This time I didn’t view the incident with some satirical philosophizing. Rather, the thought occurred to me that the chipmunk demonstrated in a real and tangible way the destructive nature of fear. 

I was no threat to the chipmunk.  I did not want to harm the chipmunk.  Had the chipmunk decided to continue running up the side walk away from me I could not have caught him/her. In fifty-nine years I have never been able to out run a chipmunk.  Further, had the chipmunk simply stayed in the grass the animal would have been safe.

However, the chipmunk succumbed to fear and that nearly cost the chipmunk its life.

Such is the destructive nature of fear.  Fear lies at the root of much the tension, division and rancor we find in our society.  Rather than engaging those things we fear, all too often we irrationally respond to them. We do so at our own peril.

We often fear what we do not understand.  We often fear those who think differently than we do because we are unwilling to examine our convictions.  We often fear change, so much so that we often leave ourselves captive to untenable situations because change seems overwhelming.

When one reads in the book of Genesis the story of the disobedience of Adam and Eve in eating the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil one sees that their first reaction was fear.  Thus, the first response to the first sin of humanity was fear.  Therefore, f ear is born out of our disobedience to the will of God.

As one turns over a few hundred pages in scripture and comes to the story of the angels announcing the birth of Christ they do so with the words, “Fear not!”  So it is that that sin brings fear into the world but the Good News of Jesus Christ tells us that fear no longer should have a hold on us.

Indeed, the anecdote for fear is trust.  It is in trusting the God who created us, who through his son Jesus Christ has redeemed us and who by his Holy Spirit sustains us, that fear is defeated.

I’m quite certain the chipmunk thought of none of those things that morning in making the near life ending dash across Whit Davis Road.  However as Ted and Steve would both tell you. we can learn a lot from a chipmunk.