tadpole musings

This summer I killed 4,269 tadpoles….more or less. Here in Argentina summer falls in December, so in November we repaired our swimming pool’s 20-year-old water pump. (Yes, we are missionaries with a pool. Call it unmerited grace scented with chlorine). After 10 months with no filtration or care, our favorite summertime hangout had become an ecological reserve of putrid water, slimy worms and thousands of hatching frog eggs.
My job was to drain the pool and bring back the clear chlorinated blue that we loved so much. As I regularly checked to see that our temperamental pump was working, I found time to look at the multitude of those little usurpers whose hours were numbered by The Great Pool Drainer.
I had come to like some of those little creatures, although I never got around to naming any of them. As a science lesson our family watched tadpoles do what, well, tadpoles do. They grew a bit and then sprouted little hind legs. They were on their way to a “productive” frog-hood.
As the pool slowly drained, I saw that the tadpoles failed to notice they were heading towards a swift water-pressure ride that would end in a fairly small filter; that is, they were heading towards oblivion. It seemed to me that nothing they could have accomplished – task committees, better leadership, focus groups, an interfaith fungi council, not even letters to the Great Pool Drainer – would cause me to turn off the pump and buy an inflatable pool to appease my family of five. I had other plans.
I don’t know a lot about tadpole hierarchy. Possibly the tadpoles in the shallow end had nothing to do with those in the deeper end, and the upper class took exclusive vacations on the ladder rungs. Maybe culture shapers and opinion makers swam around, giving meaning and basking in the murky green light of acceptance, while tadpole leaders circumnavigated the affairs of the tadpole world. Could the tadpole community have wise gurus that studied decaying leaves in order to discern the future? Might it be that tadpole literature talked about a middle-pool of raging battles, adventure and, well, I guess fire would not have been involved…
Too me, they were tadpoles, and somehow I missed all the greatness they might have seen in themselves.
As I watched their world slowly go down the drain, I thought of my world, how our leaders, opinion makers, and trendsetters biblically can’t keep us from hurtling towards oblivion. The world is under the control of a God so powerful that we are all basically on a tadpole level as far as changing his plans go. And, without his help we could understand him about as much as those tadpoles could understand The Great Pool Drainer. Yes, that unprepared polliwog population was going to experience profound crisis, and a premeditated one at that.
In our world, in the midst of severe crisis, the book of Lamentations expresses reason for hope when in turmoil:
Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed,
for his compassion’s never fail.
They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion;
therefore I will wait for him.”
The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him,
to the one who seeks him;
it is good to wait quietly
for the salvation of the Lord. (Lamentations 3:22-26)

I am working to express God’s kingdom here in Buenos Aires. I am endeavoring to advance his church and help others do what those little creatures could not: rise above all that we think is important and see the big picture of what God is doing. What a joy to have a life with a future and a hope. What a joy to share it with others, to bring Christ into our friends’ lives. What blessing to help bring a bit more peace in a world heading towards oblivion.
All that remains of that tadpole world is a small group saved for our outdoor science labs. All the filth is gone, and I now dive into a Brave Blue World. It’s not exactly the New Jerusalem, but as I sit in it on some hot afternoons, I wonder if in heaven all missionaries will have a pool…