Saturday, November 9, 2013

The Blood Trail


But now in Christ Jesus 
you who once were far away
 have been brought near 
by the blood of Christ.
Ephesians 2:13

I sealed some leaves I picked up on my walk the other day and when they dried, I put them on our table for a Fall decoration.  My husband walked by and pointed to one leaf and said, "I don't like this leaf."  I was confused and wondered why he would be so adamantly against a beautiful leaf, the one I thought was the prettiest one, the yellow one with the big red splotch on the corner.
"Why?" I asked.
"Because it's the one that can lead the tracker away from his kill.  You see," he continued, "the hunter is looking for blood stained leaves to lead him in the right direction after he's shot his deer.  The deer must be found and many are very strong, even after being shot, and wander far into the woods for protection.  Because I don't want to waste a good deer, I go after him until I find him.  When I see a leaf like this, it can lead me on another 'trail' and I can lose the deer."  That made sense to me and it's something of which I'd never thought and it got me thinking of how many times we get off the blood-stained trail of Christ.
We're well on our journey and tracking his will with all our might until, suddenly, we see what we think is the "trail of Christ" when, in fact, we've been side-tracked by the evil one who put a diversion in our way...something that looked like Christ but was actually a ploy.  Some keep following that until they get desperately lost and lose their reason for coming in the woods in the first place.  They find their way home but never get the trophy.  Some realize they are on the wrong track and return until they find the right one again and at the end of the trail, they find their prize.
I've noticed a lot of leaves like that in my walks, still like them and even more so since they remind me to stay fixed on the blood trail of Christ.



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