Lake Snakes and The Digger

PART I:

The lake near my mom’s house has become infested with snakes.  While I’m not sure that two snakes in a lake that spans 654 acres constitutes an infestation, it is, in my opinion, two snakes too many.  It’s not that there weren’t snakes there before.  I’m sure there were.  But in a lifetime of summer frolicking at the neighborhood beach, I never saw a single one.  It’s not even that I have a “beef” with snakes.  It’s just biting snakes.  If they can wrap around me and crush me with a simple flex of their serpentine body…. I’m cool with that.  If they attack with their mouths… no can do.  This is how the story unfolds.

I came home from work and asked my family, “So what did you all do today?”

“We saw some snakes!” Shout my boys (who think that this is the coolest thing to ever happen in their young lives). 

“Some what?”

“SNAKES!  Snakes, snakes, snakes, snakes” etc…

“In the yard?” 

“Nope.  In the lake.”

I passed out.

I didn’t really pass out (**please note my attempt to regain some “man points”**), but I did get pretty nervous.  I got nervous because, as far as I know, the only constricting snakes that live in the water are anacondas and, even though I’ve never seen the movie, I know that anacondas only eat woodland creatures and second rate actors.  Plus they only live in The Amazon.  That left biting snakes. 

After getting a description from my wife, I found the snake on the Internet.  It was a Northern Water Snake.  The website said that they are endangered but I just think that people are too afraid to get close enough to kill them.  Anyway, it also said that if they bite you, their saliva has an anti-coagulant in it so you won’t stop bleeding.  Great.  I can picture it now.  I come home from work.

“Where’s Elijah?”

“Getting blood transfusions.”

“Oh no!  What Happened?!?!”

“Nibbled by a snake.”

While I wanted to forbid my family from ever going back to the lake, I know that my wife, as amazing a mom as she is, would sell our kids to gypsies if she couldn’t let them run around down there.  She grew up in the Adirondack Mountains and had bears attack her house.  I figured she could handle a snake.  Even the “bite you till you bleed to death” kind. 

The next day I went to work and in the early afternoon I got a phone call from my wife.  She told me that they went to the lake again and, after she explained to the boys that snakes are not swimming ropes and they shouldn’t try and make lassos out of them, they had this conversation:

“Hey, Buddy,” said Brehm to Elijah. “I’m scared of the snakes but let’s go kill them together!”

“OK, Brehm!!”

Then off they went, splashing and pretending to kill snakes while my wife watched for REAL snakes from the beach. 

Alone: Scared.  

Together: Snake Killers.

 

PART II:

Last night was beach night at Osterville Baptist Church.  It’s a time of fellowship and beach volleyball and we baptize people in the Atlantic.  I love the symbolism of being baptized into something that much bigger than you.  Anyway, this was my third beach night and I still haven’t heard any of the “baptizees” share their stories because I usually help my wife chase after the kids.  Anyway, this beach night my in-laws were in town and she had to interpret for them since they’re both deaf.  That meant, as soon as I finished leading a couple songs, I was digging holes in the sand and climbing the lifeguard tower with the boys.  Apparently, someone had dug a big hole earlier in the day and so Brehm and Elijah wanted to jump in it.  They were running and laughing and then, WHAM!  Brehm took a major digger.  I mean he totally face-planted into the bottom of that hole.  His mouth was full of sand.  His hair and his shirt…mashed with sand.  His eyes….sandy.  All he could so was stumble over to me, looking pretty pathetic and mumble, “Dthey, Mmth ffhte, blem, rmmmm.”  Which I knew meant, “Daddy, my mouth is full of sand.  Help me wash up.”  So I led him blindly down to the ocean and gently washed his mouth, the area around his eyes and brushed his shirt off.  Then he was back to playing.  

Alone: Blind and Sandy-Mouthed.  

Together: Cleaned up and playing.

 

Alone: Scared.  Blind.  Mouthful of sand.

Together: Clean.  Free To Play.  Snake Killers. 

 

I don’t know why I have such a hard time grasping that.  It doesn’t take a genius to notice that, to steal a phrase from my church in Nashville, “Together Is Better”.  And yet this is one of the parts of the Christian life that I can fight the hardest.  I make excuses like, “I wouldn’t want to be a bother.”  Or, even worse, I can believe that my busyness is more important than someone else’s need.  I can isolate myself and live blind, sandy-mouthed, and afraid.  Or, as I’m learning to do more and more, I can be vulnerable.  I can say, “I’m scared.  Can you help me fight this?”  When I take a digger, I can stumble to a friend and ask them to help me get cleaned up.  I can stop being so selfish and be there to brush someone else off too.  Then, and only then, do I get to experience the mystery that The Bible calls The Body of Christ.  I get to know what it means to truly live life in community.  I get to experience intimacy.  I can live clean, free, and as a Snake Killer.  Is it scary?  Yes!  Is it messy?  Sometimes.  Is it what we were made for?  Absolutely.