We are familiar with the verse in Romans 8:28; All things work for the good of those who love God and are called according to HIS PURPOSE.

One of the results of the Covid 19 pandemic was the disruption to the mainstream church program. Christians worldwide were forced into lockdown and forbidden to meet as they usually would. Buildings were closed.

Many dear fellow believers pressed against the government-enforced rules and continued trying to meet as they had been. Many were distraught over the restrictions on Christian fellowship and saw it as an end-time event of persecution against the church. A new phenomenon also came into existence, the live-streaming internet church. I’ll abbreviate that to LSIC for further reading.

As our governments gradually lifted the restrictions a bit at a time, and the number of people allowed to share a room or meet outdoors increased, little pockets of believers began to meet as a forced new version of church fellowship. I’ve since heard several reports, stating that these believers experienced a kind of fellowship among the saints they weren’t used to; it sounded like a true awakening of the priesthood of all believers.

Following the ease of restrictions and the lessening threat of Covid 19, building doors opened again to the masses, although the LSIC continued. But what happened to the little pockets of believers who had been gathering in small numbers in homes, parks, and on the beach?

This morning I saw something that made me feel very sad. On my weekly visit to my mum, I took her dog Buddy for a walk (he’s about ten now, and you might recall stories involving Buddy in past blogs). Mum and Buddy have lived in a 2.5m x 8m relocatable cabin/home for the last six years, like a tiny house.

The cabin is situated on acres in the backyard of my sister’s rented home. They have a long driveway stretching out to the street, shaded by hundreds of very tall gum trees and lined with bush. For many years, I have walked Buddy (and Rocky, who we lost almost a year ago and who features in the photo) along this picturesque driveway. It has always been a fantastic opportunity for Buddy to stretch his legs, and run free without the lead or restraints of cabin life.

Sadly, this morning he was a bit different. Although obviously excited at my visit and, as usual, engrossed in his ball, his walk was a struggle. I could see he was mentally distressed as I tried to coax him into another clear paddock where he would have greater space for running than just the driveway. Oddly, he made it halfway to the paddock, grabbed his ball, and ran back to mum’s cabin at full speed.

I walked back and got him out for a second go. This time I took the lead so I could insist on his exercise. He was anxious and continually looked back over his shoulder towards the cabin. He would have headed back quick smart if he hadn’t been on the lead. Getting to the end of the driveway, which is about 70 metres long, we turned around, and I took his lead off so he could run without my fear of him running out on the road. Again, he took off and headed back to the cabin.

As I watched the back end of him disappear around the bend and out of sight as he sped back home, I felt so sad. It seemed unusual behaviour today. I asked the Lord what He was trying to show me.

Buddy has been institutionalised. He now prefers the comfort and safety of institutional life. Even though he is perfectly safe with me and loves me, he preferred the familiar. His desire for security had overruled his desire for freedom.

As I walked back up the ramp to mum’s house to check on him, I heard a rustling in the bush at the end of her tiny fenced yard. I looked up to see a large black wallaby. He was tucked between the tall boundary paling fence and a shorter wire fence, where there was a closed gate. He was panicked and became more and more frantic the closer I got to the gate.

As I stretched my arms over the fence to open the gate so he could get through, he was pushing and shoving in the farthest corner away from me, trying to force his way through the wire. He tried numerous times to jump over it but was so tightly tucked into the corner to keep a safe distance from me that he had no leverage. He was growing more and more distressed.

I unhitched the latch, and the gate swung open, but the wallaby was so panicked in the corner he hadn’t noticed. He was doing all he could, going a few feet to the right and back to the left, head-butting the wire, jumping and shoving. Finally, he got closer to the gate, saw his way through and took off like a rocket! Free!!

Buddy’s and the wallaby’s responses to being confined were complete opposites. Buddy had grown so used to the confinement he couldn’t bear freedom. He was distressed, scared, and unable to cope with it, so he preferred to return to what he knew. He forsook freedom and liberty for false security.

On the other hand, the wallaby knew freedom and where he belonged. He refused any confinement at all and did all in his power to free himself. He reacted violently. The minute he saw the opening, there was no holding him back. He was gone in an instant, out into the wide world of the Australian bush, where he was free and at home.

Are the correlations obvious?

Furthermore, my mother has dementia, so Buddy is not well looked after in her care. It takes my sister’s involvement and mine to keep him healthy and safe. But he doesn’t know this. He thinks mum and that 2.5m x 8m tiny house is the safest environment in the world.

Sometimes, it’s hard to leave what we have always known. Because we have grown so used to it, we start believing it is the best thing for us. The thought of leaving it makes us feel scared. We don’t want to take the risk of discomfort and the unknown. Subsequently, we forget how to be free.

For others, they know freedom is theirs, and with all their might, they will take it.

It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery. Galatians 5:10, NIV

From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been subject to violence, and the violent lay claim to it. Matt 11:12, BSB

Jesus spoke of taking the kingdom of God by force, doing violence to get in. These scriptures speak of the recognition of what life in Christ really is. And they speak of faith and desperation to obtain it.

There are many obstacles for the believer who feels the call of God’s purpose out from the LSIC or the ‘way we’ve always done things’ and senses that tug in their heart for the priesthood of all believers to which God called us (Jeremiah 31:33-34).

One of these obstacles is not knowing where to go once we’ve walked away from the familiar. What on earth do we do now? It might have been a pleasant surprise and a taste of something heavenly for those believers who began to meet together outside the LSIC, but how do they keep going in that direction? Especially now that the building doors are open again.

If Buddy had trusted my goodness and love toward him, he could have run free and exercised, and sniffed all the new smells of a new day. An experience awaited him that his heart longs for, one he is made for. If only he’d trusted me. If only he trusted that the awkwardness and discomfort would work out for his good.

Ironically, some months ago, Buddy came to stay with us for one week while he recovered from some injuries. He was rather demure and lost during the first few days, particularly since I hadn’t brought his ball with him, which acts as his security blanket.

To put this in context of the message of this post, perhaps the security of his ball could be likened to traditional practises we continue with year after year within a religious institution. Things like the way we pray, worship or fellowship, and have set programs and formats we follow. Nevertheless, since he no longer had his ball as his entire focus and obsession, a few days into his stay, Buddy began to make eye contact with us and engage. He was lifting his head. Selah.

Buddy preferred to sit outside at our front fence throughout his stay, watching the world go by. He was like a child in a candy shop; he was captivated, to say the least. People and dogs were walking past, who he could get a hello and pat from or a friendly sniff. There were smells and sounds that differed every day. There was movement and light and life going on around him. There was a vast open sky above him filled with distant calls of dogs and smells of the ocean.

Not only that but he was walked twice a day, enabling him to get the local news from what is now commonly known here as ‘pee-mail’! Every tree, pole and thousands of blades of grass seemed to thrill him no end as he dug his little brown nose deep into them. To top all of this, he spent two days with our previous dog-sitter, spending each day playing with other little dogs, coming home exhausted and obviously completely satisfied. He was becoming a dog. His identity was finally being discovered. Selah, again.

By the end of the week, Buddy was a different dog. He was confident, engaged, and relaxed. There was no sign of anxiety or pain as he was nursed through his recovery. Once over the general shock of the change, he found his way around this new life and was filled with beans! He was filled with awe at the life that was going on that, until then, he had known nothing about.

Of course, Buddy had to be returned to my mum. Reports quickly came back to me of his restlessness. He wasn’t content anymore to sit on the same chair day in and day out in silence, staring out a closed glass door. Even my mum complained that there was ‘something wrong with him’, ‘he’s just not the same dog’, and she even asked us to keep him because he was clearly ‘so unhappy’. That was sad for mum, of course, who didn’t even remember he had been away from her.

However, eventually, Buddy’s restlessness turned into depression. He obviously realised he couldn’t escape his old life and that the freedom he had experienced so briefly was no longer his. That would depress anyone. But that was a few months ago now. Sadly, although mercifully because of the circumstances, he has returned to his former state. His ball remains his one obsession, and he spends his days going from one chair to mum’s bed and back to the chair again. My sister walks him twice daily, which is his only opportunity to stretch his legs. And, of course, he has an outing one day a week with mum and me. That returns us to the story at the beginning of this post.

Once having tasted freedom, unlike Buddy, we are left with a choice. We can embrace the freedom and take it violently with the ferocity of that wallaby, or we can return to what we know, the familiar, what we’ve always done.

What happened to all those little pockets of saints who started to experience a taste of the priesthood of all believers? Where are they now?

God is not only watching our planet, He is shaking it. He is preparing and building, working to His plan. Will we trust Him with something new? Will we take it with all the violence of those Jesus spoke of in Matthew 11? Will we forge ahead through the discomfort of leaving the familiar, for the sake of running free with Him, to explore the vast open spaces He has for us?

Let’s watch this space.