I went camping with some children; two boys, ages 11 and 9, and a girl, 11, along with 4 adults. The campers slept on a rocky ledge with a large overhang, which we called a cave. I did not sleep that night because I knew, from a previous experience, that my bedding was inadequate for the nearly freezing temperatures that were forecast. At dusk, I left the camp and headed back for the home of the host on whose land the group camped.

Before I left, I entrusted my flint to the 11-year-old boy. I had always wanted to try it myself, but hadn't really had the occasion. One of the purposes of the campout was for the children to learn "camping basics." For each skill learned, they would receive an "honor," a beautiful cloth patch that could be sewn onto their Pathfinder Club uniforms. One of the skills was: "Know six ways to start a fire without a match." The children, being typical, were excited about gaining their "honors," and I knew they would appreciate the chance to start a fire with my flint.

When I returned to camp in the morning, the two master campers were still sound asleep in their well-thought-out bedding. The children were already up, in various stages of huddling the fire, finding the latrine, and hiding in the brush to pounce on me as I approached. After the usual greasy pancake breakfast, I asked the boy if he had had opportunity to try out the flint. "Well," he informed me, "it didn't work."

I looked at him in shocked disbelief. Didn't work? My flint?

The flint method of starting a fire requires a piece of steel, a flint (hard rock, a form of silica, the same material which makes up sand), and tinder. My brother-in-law had made my little flint fire starter and he never made anything that didn't work right. Armed with a pocketknife, one was ready for some real fire-starting. Ever since Jim had given me mine, I hadn't tested it. I could see his starter worked just fine. I saw him start several fires with his.

My flint didn't work?! I looked at Michael, and said, "Give it to me." The 11 year old girl, a very precocious child, piped up, "You have to have something, like magnesium or something, to work this flint, and yours probably isn't made of the right stuff."

She didn't know Jim. She had never seen him start fires with his starters, and in her eyes I was just this misguided middle-aged lady who didn't know much about camping. (And she's right.)

Still, I gathered a few very dry leaves and twigs together, and piled them into a small heap on the stone slab. In my mind, I tried to recollect the scenario of Jim starting a fire. Striking the flint as hard as I could with the backside of the knife blade created the tiniest spark. I was encouraged. "It only takes a spark, to get a fire going," started playing through my brain.

Was there a step I was missing? Yes! But I didn't know it at the time. The magnesium was supposed to be used as tinder. You scrape a bit of it off, and then strike the flint towards that little pile and that starts your fire. But my ignorance of the starter, alloyed with my assurance that it would work, just kept me striking the flint harder and harder. The sparks became larger. The children were crowded around me, and, seeing the potential, jumped up and got some toilet paper off the roll, crumpled it and piled it with the leaves and twigs.

Puff. There it was, the first glowing ember. I blew on it lightly and it sprung up into a nice little flame. Satisfied, I tucked the flint into my pocket.

If I hadn't seen Jim do it, I never would have been so sure of myself. I knew it had to work, because I knew Jim. His craftsmanship was as perfect as a human being could make something.

I started thinking about the whole experience in relation to spiritual things. How could Abraham have even considered plunging a knife into his miraculously born "son of promise" if he didn't know, really know, the voice of the One who was asking him to do this? How could Joseph have consented to marry the pregnant Mary, knowing full well that he wasn't the father? Since he wasn't, who was? Joseph had this dream, you understand, and he recognized the real Father's voice. "That's my baby," the Father said. So Joseph married her.

And how could Christ have gone to the cross, if He didn't know the Father? What kind of a Father would allow such a thing to happen to his son? Remember the Son's pitiful plea: "Oh my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt." Matthew 26:39.

So, folks, let's get to know Him. Stupendous, earth-shaking things are soon to come upon us, "…and there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that time." Daniel 12:2. The prophecies of the Bible are about to be fulfilled. We know, from the signs given to us by the Master Teacher when He was here, that soon calamities, pestilences, violent forces of nature, and all the demons of unconverted hearts will be unleashed upon an unsuspecting, unready world that has spurned God's overtures of grace. If we wondered where God was during 911, I can't begin to imagine what we will wonder about Him when "…the vials of the wrath of God are poured out upon the earth." Are we going to ask ourselves, "What is He so mad about?" Or are we going to be walking in step with Him, understanding His timing, His solutions, and His providences. Are we going to be able to say, with all our heart, "God is love?" Will we believe it?

Let's get to really know Him. "Many shall be purified, and made white, and tried; but the wicked shall do wickedly: and none of the wicked shall understand; but the wise shall understand." Daniel 12:10. How is it that we will understand? How do we get to know Him? Ah, He's written a whole book about Himself. "The words," He said, "that I speak to you, they are spirit and they are life." Luke 6:63.

Chris Hasse and the Pathfinder campers will present a Bible Seminar at Upper West Fork Community Park, starting mid-April. Look for advertising at the beginning of the month.

Chris Hasse was raised in Michigan, but spent most of her adult life in a "traveling" mode. In 1992, she and her husband, John, moved to Chloe, in Calhoun County, where they currently reside. Her vocations are gardening, writing, and "fishing." (See Matthew 4:19)