During this sabbatical from preaching, I've not only been reading a number of different books but I've also made it my aim to look over some of my notes and quotes from other books I've read recently lest I forget them. And one of my favorite recent books is actually a children's book called Watership Down by Richard Adams. It's a story of a group of rabbits led by a rabbit named Hazel who leave their comfortable but overcrowded warren (the name for rabbit burrows) to find a new home of their own. After a long, frigid, dangerous beginning to their journey through woods and past foxes and hawks, the rabbits were ready to give up the search. After days of journeying, they were giving up hope they would ever find a new home that would supply what a small group of rabbits need. Even worse, they started fighting amongst themselves biting and scratching one another. Then, finally, after Hazel had said, "Not far now" for the millionth time, the panicking rabbits arrived at a beautiful, lush, green field, and they all knew they had finally made it home. It says,To come to the end of a time of anxiety and fear! To feel the cloud that hung over us lift and disperse-the cloud that dulled the heart and made happiness no more than a memory! This at least is one joy that must have been known by almost every living creature. Here is a boy who was waiting to be punished. But then, unexpectedly, he finds that his fault has been overlooked or forgiven and at once the world reappears in brilliant colors, full of delightful prospects. Here is a soldier who was waiting, with a heavy heart, to suffer and die in battle. But suddenly the luck has changed. There is news! The war is over and everyone bursts out singing! He will go home after all! The sparrows in the plowland were crouching in terror of the kestrel. But she has gone; and they fly pell-mell up the hedgerow, frisking, chattering and perching where they will. The bitter winter had all the country in its grip. The hares on the down, stupid and torpid with cold, were resigned to sinking further and further into the freezing heart of snow and silence. But now-who would have dreamed it?-the thaw is trickling, the great tit is ringing his bell from the top of a bare lime tree, the earth is scented; and the hares bound and skip in the warm wind. Hopelessness and reluctance are blown away like a fog and the dumb solitude where they crept, a place desolate as a crack in the ground, opens like a rose and stretches to the hills and the sky.The tired rabbits fed and basked in the sunny meadows as though they had come no further than from the bank at the edge of the nearby copse. The heather and the stumbling darkness were forgotten as though the sunrise had melted them. I don't know about you, but I find it impossible to read this description of the rabbit's new home and not think of heaven. In heaven there will be an end of anxiety and fear. In heaven we who should be punished for sin will be forgiven. In heaven the war against sin, death, and Satan will be finished. In heaven there will be complete freedom from all the harshness of this life. In heaven all of our troubles and cares will be forgotten and will melt away. When we look around this world at all our many stressors and pains, we can say with the rabbits, "We need a new home." And to that Jesus tells us, "Not far now. Keep going. It's not far now."
