Life on the claims
This week my wife and I visited her mother who is recuperating in a local rest home after being discharged from a short stay in hospital. My father in law, now in his nineties, drove from their house to meet us for lunch in the local shopping mall. From there we proceeded on to see my mother in law at the rest home. It was the occasion of their 58th wedding anniversary.
Cheesecake and flowers were acquired on route to the rest home to share, and as gifts for my mother in law. One of the family, I am not sure who, had also framed a photo of the two of them on holiday together some years ago at an old gold prospecting location in our country. Already retired and elderly at the time, they were standing at what looked like a train station, done up to resemble a by-gone era, with bag in hand, ready to prospect for gold. (This is now a tourist attraction, with gravels from the old tailings put in troughs for people to pan and try their luck, but in its day it was a proper gold rush town.) My father in law in the picture had an ironic and rather cheeky smile on his face – an adventure for two old people, as if they were young again, setting out to find their fortune.
The photo moved me, and I have been thinking on the message it gave me as I looked on it. Prospecting for gold, staking a claim. Is that not what marriage – and life – is like?
To find a partner, we are prospecting as we go our way along the river, and we see a few flecks of gold. Is it a fortune? Or a just a few, chance flecks? Perhaps we are circumspect, considering the location and the chance of success. Or perhaps we feel a bit of ‘gold fever’? Seeing the gold there in the river, our heart leaps – surely this is the ‘big one’? And so together with another, we stake our claim.
We don’t know from panning a few flecks whether there is a rich seam that runs deep, a lode of treasure lying waiting among the stones – or whether we will labour hard for little reward. That is the nature of prospecting. To know more you must make a choice, and a commitment. Your ability to stake a claim is limited, and the river is already full of claims from one end to the other; those parts are not available.
Nowadays it is common for young couples to enter upon a life together for many years – perhaps even have children – before deciding to marry. Or perhaps they never marry, and still may remain together. But in reality, whether it is the ‘great leap’ of a Christian marriage, with only ‘courting’ beforehand, or a more gradual commitment, the principles and risks are hard to avoid. Once the relationship becomes intimate, it is life changing, whether intended to be so or not. And if commitment is limited – then the ability to recover the treasure is also limited. A brief or shallow scrape will not secure it; one must dig deep, and often long, to lay hold on riches.
And so I was moved by the picture of my mother and father in law. It has not been an easy life for them. They have worked hard to make a living and, I suspect, to make a life together. One cannot say in the beginning, when together you stake a claim, whether you will hit bedrock after only a few depths of the spade. Or if it may turn out, by chance, that the gold seen at the outset was not a portent of any further treasure, but fleeting. Or whether the yield will be steady, or sporadic; or what calamities may beset the venture in the years that pass.
My mother and father in law’s takings from the claim they struck, however much or little, and however hard the labour of winning it, they treasure. They do not compare with others, or feel bitterness or regret at the difficulty of it all – a life on the claims. They made theirs, and stuck with it. They have something to show for it: memories, good or bad, which they can still look upon together. A wry smile – ‘if only we had known..’
‘In everything give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.’ (1 Thessalonians 5:18)
I know that if I had provided for my children to go on a great adventure, with many wonders, I would wish for them to take the chance to go, and to make the most of it. I would wish for them to have joy in it, and to wonder, and to feel all the excitement and challenge and achievement it could bring. But if they found the challenge too great – or if the train broke down, or the food was bad, or the weather atrocious – I would hope they could still laugh and at least make light of it, if not at the time then perhaps later. And if they could see it like that, no matter what befell, my love for them would be kindled.
I would wish my children to have no regrets, and to know that I intended none of those misfortunes; but that better days, and better adventures lie ahead, beyond the farthest horizon, so far and beyond anything we could dream.
So I believe our God rejoices in our rejoicing, in our thanks, however the great adventure goes, and whatever becomes of it. And if it is the worst of times, we can only feel that way about it if we know this is only a brief excursion, and the great adventure lies ahead. Believe that and you will not be disappointed.
So take heart in the journey that lies before us, whether you have journeyed long, or stand at the outset. Stake a claim when the day comes, when the gold shines wonderful in the palm of your hand; stick with it. But if the flood washes it away, gather what you have, and stake another. Or else take a quiet life in the old hut by the tailings, and think on the great adventure, and life on the claims. And as our God makes us able, let us be thankful.
‘But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.’ (Philippians 4:19).
Amen.
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