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The Field
Flash Fiction/ FaithWriters Challenge Writing
Word Count 653
God’s
hand is always moving, helping, directing and saving at all times. Most
of the time we do not see God’s mighty hand working, and many claim that
there is no God because they do not see this great Helper at work all
around them.
In early June of
1979, when I was two and a half, I was kidnapped while at my baby
sitter’s house. I did not meet my mother until I was almost six…that’s
right over three and a half years. I had a really strange life and every
reason in the world to be a very bitter and angry man. Yet it is amazing
to me how the great invisible hand was at work during the most critical
time in my young life. I would love to share with you one of those
stories.
The year was
1981. I was four years old and living in a little town in Arizona,
hundreds of miles away from those who had been searching for me for the
last year and a half in northern California. It is amazing to me how
some memories are as vivid as yesterday, and this is one of those
memories.
I very vividly
recall that is was a cold day, maybe even early January. I was outside
playing with my G.I.Joe and Star Wars action figures in a huge field in
front of my ‘family’s’ house.
As I walked and
looked out over this massive field of weeds and foot-high dead grass
searching for a place to build tiny fortresses and battlefields, I had
no idea that this wonderland of hiding places was hiding steel-jaw fox
traps which were spread out strategically out over the entire field.
For a few hours I
was a four year old God, directing a war between Luke Skywalker of the
space armies and Duke of the G.I.Joe ground patrol in an intergalactic
invasion on earth. I remember running through the field as my hero and
the villain flew through the air shooting missiles at each other. I
rolled on the ground, jumped over tiny ant hill villages, and crawled
through the grass, hidden to the outside world.
Then to my horror
I heard the most terrifying sound a little boy could hear. It was a high
pitched shriek of a tormented animal. It was my Collie dog Toby. He had
run out to see me and fell into the jaws of one of the steel traps. I
ran as fast as I could, leaving my toys, to my house screaming with fear
and pain for my dog who was flipping around yelping nonstop.
The man who was
taking care of me ran out with a friend and, after about a half hour,
set my dog free and was off to the vet. The next day I was warned not to
ever go into the field, because there were traps laid out everywhere.
That night I
thought about my dog, and my toys still out there. I thought that I
would go out in the morning to get my toys and then I would never go out
there again. The next morning when I woke up I found my toys in my bed
with me, but at breakfast no one claimed to have gotten them.
A month later
when my ‘guardian’ brought a tractor to the field to till it, he and his
friends found over 60 traps that were ready to bite. Yet none bit me.
It was the unseen
Hand at work, I know it. I have seen this great invisible hand of God at
work many times growing up, including in the circumstances that led to
my safe return to my mother after three and a half years. I would love
to share that story with you later. God bless you in your continuous
pursuit of a closer relationship with Jesus Christ.
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