There’s an
old poem by Robert Burns that was a favourite of mine when I was boy.
The poem
starts with the lines :
Wee,
sleeket, cowran, tim’rous beastie,
O, what a
panic’s in thy breastie!
Thou need
na start awa sae hasty,
The mouse,
startled by the farmer, sets itself up into a panic and does what mice do and
quickly tries to exit. But the farmer has no plans nor indeed heart to hurt the
mouse. After all, the farmer has ploughed up the mouse’s home and left it nowhere
to live and with winter coming on!
And in that
moment of contemplating the mouse, the farmer reflects on his own life, and how
things aren’t quite the way he wants them. Indeed, Burns gives us the famous
line:
The best
laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men
Gang aft agley,
An’ lea’e
us nought but grief an’ pain,
For promis’d joy!
The mouse,
as mice do, will find another spot and build a new house, and be warm for a
winter that the farmer clearly is not looking forward to. We don’t know the
farmer’s circumstances, but he does tell us life has been tough, as he compares
himself with the mouse, and declares the mouse better off. The farmer’s past it
seems has been full of “prospects drear” and in looking forward, he can only
guess what might happen and fear.
At the end,
it’s all pretty bleak. The farmer has let his circumstances crowd out the
promise of God. He can’t see beyond his current circumstances. Things just aren’t
going right for him. I wonder if he has included God in any of his thoughts. I
wonder if God has been allowed into his heart.
The farmer’s
statement reminds me of Matthew 6:34, “So do not worry about tomorrow; for
tomorrow will care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.”
Except the
farmer is anxious. He cannot see a future with any hope. He’d rather be the
mouse.
However,
earlier in Matthew we are told that being anxious does not add a single hour to
our lives. (Matt. 6:27) Our “heavenly Father knows” what we need. And if we “But
seek first His kingdom and His righteousness … all these things will be added
to you.” (6:33)
I am left at
the end of the Burns poem wondering whether or not the farmer would have shed a
different light on things if his trust was fully in the Lord?
Yes, things
don’t always go the way you want them to. But isn’t it those things we should
also give thanks for because they highlight us those things we have that are
right and that He has given us? There are things that Father God has put in
place for those who earnestly seek Him, and in these things we see His Love,
His providential care.
Whatever
problems we face we should face in faith and thankfulness, with our hearts fully
open to Him.
Amen.