Article March 10, 2003 Issue

The rattlesnake and the dove

By Eva-Maria Hogrefe

While I was living on a ranch in South Dakota, some of our neighbors told us that the area was infested with rattlesnakes. But I never saw one. One day I asked a rancher how that could be, and he said, "You know, you are a danger to them. And they hide from danger." That made sense. Not exposing themselves to danger.

There are effective ways to pray about protection from danger. In the Bible, for example, Jesus said to his disciples, "Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves" (Matt. 10:16). I think of this as meaning we need to be wise first, before we can be harmless to ourselves and others. And I have asked myself, "What is the wisdom of a serpent?"

Maybe one thing it means is not exposing oneself to danger. And perhaps at the root of this kind of wisdom and safety is the idea of not adopting or relying on mistaken notions about God, humanity, or the world at large. We can be wise enough to recognize a mistaken notion for what it is—a mistake. Then we can let our love for God and our respect for His creation show what is true.

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