“Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise,…” – Ephesians 5:15
Fishing the high country, where the brook trout live, requires complete focus on your feet. There is no well warn path. Just rocks, logs, crevices, rhododendron tangles, and the occasional boulder field.
More than that, if you want to catch fish, it requires going slowly. You must study the water, consider your approach, think through the cast before you make it.
As I get older, and often find myself fishing alone in remote places, I am well aware that I am one misplaced footstep away from a very bad situation. Perhaps being older is actually an asset because it forces me to be deliberate. I must be present through every moment.
In the broader sense of life, I find overall I am ever more careful in the paths I take. Understanding that I am not the one creating the path. I leave that to God who creates all paths. My obligation is to prayerfully seek the path, to get on it, to look straight forward, and mind my steps.
Like a trout stream, I can not help but wonder what is around the bend, but that takes my focus, and I stumble over the rocks.
“…redeeming the time, for the days are evil.” – Ephesians 5:16
We only get so much time on the river. We must plan our time there well. So far from the truck, we must plan our pace. Nightfall is eminent. Darkness is no time to find yourself still in the canyon.
The path and time, they are connected. Just as water flows over rock, the minutes of this life flow by. If I am on the path set for me, there is blessing. If I am on the path, there is no such thing as wasted time.
I have never spent an hour on a brook trout stream that I later relented was a waste. Not once have I stewed over all of the other things I could have been doing. Instead, I find myself questioning why so much life has passed since the last time I enjoyed moments such as the ones with a two-weight in my hand casting a dry fly to a five inch trout surrounded by Heaven itself.
With more time behind me than before me now, this ways heavy. Redeem the time. Take it back from all those things that consume it and bare no fruit.
“Wherefor be ye not unwise, but understanding what the will of the Lord is.” – Ephesians 5:17
To know God’s will requires silence. There is a beautiful silence found in the high country where the trout live. As the wind rustles through the autumn leaves above and the water cascades over the rocks and plunges into the pool below, that still, small voice of my savior whispers to me. “Be patient, be careful, be wise…follow my path….consider your pace….redeem the time.”
“Follow me (Jesus), and I will make you fishers of men” – Matthew 4:19
