Sooty Claws

Satan, I fear thy sooty claws,
I hate thy brunstane stink.

~ Robbie Burns (brunstane = brimstone)

Did Robbie Burns think he was speaking metaphorically, or that old satan was out of earshot? Be careful what ye wail in the dark o’ the nicht; there are listening ears who would wish you harm. Dietrich Bonhoeffer said the only safe thing Eve could have said to the serpent was, “Go away, Satan.” There are things that go bump in the night. Speaking of which a wonderful story from the lumber room of my mind comes welling up to the surface.

It seems that Smith Wigglesworth, an old pentecostal preacher in the early 1900s, was safely tucked away in bed attired in nightgown and cap, when he was awoken by a noise from the downstairs of his home. He rose up, turned on the light and headed for the top of stairs and looked down. Stumbling up the stairs towards him was a monstrous demonic form, groping hands outstretched, chains dragging behind him. Wigglesworth apparently looked down the stairs at the apparition and said, “Oh, it’s you!” turned out the light, and went back to bed.

However neither you nor I have the simple faith or experience of Smith Wigglesworth. Rather we should say, “Kyrie, I hide myself in Thee. Be Thou my Shield and Defender!” Even if not everything that goes bump in the night is a benign figment of our imagination, greater is He that is in us, than he who is in the world. Of course if your life is not hid in Christ, then who is he, or it, that is in you, if it is not the Christ?