What Was I Thinking?

This story is more truth than fiction, even the ending, as I just may be joining my husband and the youth group for this trip once again this summer -sigh!

What Was I Thinking?
by Sharlyn Guthrie

I still don’t know why I said “yes” when he popped the big question. No, I’m not talking about a marriage proposal. The question my husband asked went something like this, “I finally talked the youth pastor into taking the youth to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area this summer. Isn’t that great? He wants us to chaperone. You’ll go along, won’t you?”

I was raised in a hotel loving, all-girl family. I had never been in a motor boat, much less a canoe. Still, my sense of adventure was stirred. When my teenage son blurted, “YOU’RE going to the Boundary Waters?!” something in his tone challenged me.

My husband was like a child waiting for Christmas. He counted the weeks and then the days. He dragged me to stores I had never shopped in before to purchase items I didn’t know existed –collapsible dinnerware, green vinyl rain ponchos and camouflage hats with netting that tied over your face. I laughed, informing him that I intended to maintain my stylish reputation. He laughed back –an evil cackle, really. I should have been very scared.

We began packing. “I’m having a little trouble over here,” I informed him. My pack was bulging, while another sizable pile of necessities waited to be included.

My husband quickly pinpointed the problem. “You packed too many clothes. You only need one set to stay dry and one to get wet.”

“For a whole week?” Doubts were mounting, but the next item to go was my make-up. “You’re kidding me!” He wasn’t.

Thirty one teens and chaperones launched fifteen canoes into Farm Lake, following prayer and a few instructions. “Don’t stand up or shift your weight suddenly. Remember the phrase ‘up a creek without a paddle?’ It can happen here. Tents don’t float.” Halfway across the lake those instructions were demonstrated with much more clarity than any flight attendant’s oxygen mask routine.

The occupants of two canoes playfully lunged at each other as they passed. One canoe flipped, depositing two teens, their packs, and tent into bone-chilling water. Ignoring the shrieks of bobbers in life-vests, the guides grabbed their packs instead. But the tent had already sunk. The canoe was righted and repacked, though one paddle had drifted away unnoticed amidst the commotion.




At camp two cold, wet boys solemnly spread their wet belongings on tree branches, then huddled near the fire. Although they were sheepish in their request for tent space it was soon granted. Three now had to squeeze into tents designed for two.

“Let’s go for a walk,” my exultant husband called, grabbing a shovel.

“Okay,” I responded, skipping ahead of him. “This is fun. How far are we going?”

“How about over here? It’s off the path for privacy’s sake, but not too far away in case of bears.”

I hesitated. “Just what are we talking about doing over here?”

“We’re digging the latrine.”

Speechless, I just stood there watching him dig that hole. My husband ignored me, but a sinister grin played at the corners of his mouth.

Meanwhile, the contents of a bag labeled “beef stroganoff” were dumped into boiling lake water. The resulting substance convinced most of us to skip supper and retreat to our tents early. It was a good thing, too. The stroganoff moved swiftly through those who ate it, resulting in many trips to the now totally disgusting latrine.

We awoke to rain. Grudgingly I donned the ugly green poncho, casting sideways glances at my gleeful husband. On day two of drizzle I became openly hostile. “What were you thinking? What was I thinking?” His smirk remained intact.


The sun broke through just before going down on that second day, creating a spectacular sunset. My husband raised his arm, attempting an embrace. “You stink!” I snapped, and reality hit. We hadn’t bathed for three days, yet we had paddled hard, sweating under ponchos. Using a tarp my husband fashioned a shower, then poured cold lake water over me as I yelped and hollered. Then I returned the favor. It was a high price to pay for cleanliness.

Mosquitoes as large as hummingbirds converged on us at dusk. Out came the funky hat my husband had selected for the occasion.

I wish I could say that things improved after that. They didn’t. Joyfully I returned to the land of warm showers and flush toilets.

Yesterday my husband asked, “Are you going back to the Boundary Waters with us next summer?”

I have no idea why, but I said, “Yes!”











Friday Fiction is hosted this week by Catrina Bradley on her blog, A Work In Progress.

Soaping the Pot

by Sharlyn Guthrie

“Always soap the bottom of a pan before putting it on the fire,” the wilderness guide instructed his less-than-rapt audience.

“What’s that do, make the fire purtier?” Slade’s comment evoked guffaws from his inner-city buddies who, like him, felt out of place in the Canadian wilderness.

“He who speaks first rests last,” the guide quipped, handing Slade the soap and skillet.

Slade cursed under his breath, but grabbed the skillet and began spreading the slimy substance over its outer surface.

“Swearing just earned you the title of dishwasher tonight, too.”

George, the boys’ counselor, had been silently observing, but dramatically retrieved a green pot scrubber from his hip pocket. “Soap the skillet, Slade. But leave the pasta pot to me. This wonder-scrubber can scrape the warts off a toad. If my scrubber doesn’t clean the un-soaped pasta pot quicker than you clean your soaped skillet, I’ll do the remaining dishes. Otherwise, they’re all yours.”

The guide couldn’t help smirking as George shook on the deal and smugly plunked his pot on the grate.

Experience had taught George that intervention was more than a long-range goal for this edgy group. It was a minute by minute effort. His quick thinking had eased the tension and prevented a situation from escalating. It was one reason why he was successful with at-risk teens.

George had earned the boys’ trust and respect, but their hearts were iron-clad. “Father, melt their hearts. Help me show them their need,” was George’s constant prayer. It was also his purpose in bringing them to the wilderness –far from broken homes and filthy streets, disconnected from cell phones, drug dealers, and i-pods.

Meal preparation continued under the guide’s direction. Soon all were engaged in raucous banter as they performed their assigned tasks. The meal didn’t look half-bad, and since it was the only offering, no one turned it down.

“Now for the pot scrubbing test. Observe.” George whipped out the scrubber and straddled a rock. He confidently began to scrub.

“Hey, man! What happened to ready, set, go?” Slade grabbed the skillet and dishrag.

The contest didn’t last long. Much to his surprise, Slade’s rag wiped a clean swath with each swipe over the skillet. George, meanwhile, grimaced and grunted as he scrubbed his pot, with little to show for his effort.

Slade slapped out a victory beat on the gleaming skillet’s bottom. The others began to chant. “Soap’s cool. Slade’s no fool…”

It was dark by the time George finished the dishes. His muscles ached; his hands were raw; and the blackened pot would never be the same. But God had spoken to him through the sweat and the grime. Maybe this was the message that would soften the boys’ hearts.

“Guess I deserved to do dishes tonight,” George admitted, rolling down his shirtsleeves. “My own stubborn pride is what did me in. I did learn something, though. Soaping a pot saves a whole lot of work.”

The boys chuckled and George grinned. “It made me realize that you guys are a lot like these pots.” He let their jeers and snickers fade before continuing. “You’re all headed for a fire of some kind or another. Some of you are already feeling it. Alex here has to work after school just to help his mom buy groceries. Jaydon’s dad died of AIDS two months ago. The fire is something different for each of you, but you’re all going to face it.”

“I can’t put out the fire, but I can offer you soap.” George raised the bottle of soap with one hand. “The soap is Jesus. I’m offering Him to you tonight just as I have many times before. He simply asks you to choose Him. He has already done the rest. He died so that you could live. He lives again to go with you through the fire. Will you still stubbornly insist on doing it your own way? Or will you let Jesus shield you from the darkness of this world? Will you soap the pot?”

George bowed his head. His shoulders heaved, betraying his emotions. Just then the bottle of soap was removed from his hand. He watched incredulously as Slade bowed his head over the soap. Then the next young man reached for it, and the next. Slowly, silently, it made its way through the entire group.

To an unenlightened observer such reverence for soap might have seemed an odd expression of faith, but to George it was perfect.




Whew! It has been a busy week, and I haven’t had time for blogging. I’m glad I can join Friday Fiction today with a previously written story. This one was a Faithwriters entry for the saying, “a stitch in time saves nine.” It received an editor’s choice award, and was 6th place overall. The story is fiction. However, my husband and I have often camped in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area, and soaping the pot is a trick we learned from one of our guides. It really works!

Be sure to visit Karlene at Heart and Soul for links to more Friday Fiction.

A Matter of Life and Bears

“Up an’ at ‘em!” my husband, John, called in his wide-awake morning voice. Moans and groans filled the camper as our three sons and I struggled to open our eyes. “We gotta get goin’ to beat the heat.”

We awoke to a picturesque morning in the Smoky Mountains, delicate ribbons of haze wisping around us as we made our way to and from the shower house. Once breakfast was over and the camper secured we launched into our planned hike up the mountain to the Appalachian Trail.

Our trek was well underway when my husband casually inquired, “Did you see the bear in the creek next to the shower house this morning?”

“Stop it!” I chided, “That’s not funny.”

“No, really! There was a bear…musta been thirty feet from the building.”

As we trudged on, my asthma kicked in, the altitude inhibiting my breathing, and I fell behind. The boys were seemingly unaffected by mountain air, and John was unwilling to let them show him up. Soon all four were out of sight.

A branch crackled behind me, then another. The bear! She’s coming up the trail! My steps quickened at the thought. Ahead of me the brush rustled. Must be her cub. Am I between them? I was nearly jogging now, my sons’ chatter no longer audible.

Soon my legs felt as heavy as the logs that lined the path. Side aching, chest burning, I puckered my lips, faintly emitting our family whistle-call. No reply! Knees trembling, heart pounding, I rounded the next bend, the bear’s breath hot on my neck.

My family stood along a fence rail, silently observing the beauty they had stumbled upon, oblivious to the approaching…

Oh, whew! What a relief! A quick glance behind me revealed that the only thing pursuing me was my imagination. I collapsed, gasping for breath.

My family found this incident hilarious. I found it mostly embarrassing. It did, however, confirm how much I value life. During those terrifying minutes (Or was it an hour?) I prayed, I pleaded, I bargained.

Remembering this experience brings the following verse to mind:

“If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake, he is the one who will save it.” *

This verse is not speaking of physical death, of course, but of spiritually dying to self. The struggle, however, is the same. It matters not whether we are speaking of physical life or spiritual life. I am bent on self-preservation. But Jesus says that in order to live I must die! How does one so set on living choose to die?

God often reveals the parts of my being that are still clinging to life by putting a cross in my path. I may struggle, cry, plead, and finally, at the point of collapse, die to whatever it is I am selfishly holding onto. What He asks of me, though, is something different. He asks me to daily, voluntarily give up my life so that I can really live!

Dying to self isn’t a very popular concept, especially in the time and culture in which we live. We are constantly encouraged to protect, pamper, and take pride in ourselves. Many saints of old embraced this concept, however. The following was written by Fenelon, a seventeenth century French archbishop who knew firsthand, as well as through the experiences of those he counseled, what it meant to suffer for the cause of Christ.

“The death of self must be voluntary, and it can only be accomplished as far as you allow. Anyone who resists death and repels its advances shows that he is not willing to die. You must be willing to yield to the will of God whenever He decides to remove from you all of the props on which you have leaned. Sometimes you must give up even your most spiritual friends, if they are props. “What fearest thou, oh thou of little faith?”

Do you fear that He may not be able to supply to you from Himself that help which He may have taken away on the human level? And why does He take human help away, except to supply you from Himself, and to purify you by the painful lesson?” **

Fenelon goes straight to the heart of the issue. When I resist dying to self I am actually exhibiting fear –fear that God is insufficient. When I voluntarily die to self I allow Him to supply my every need and recognize His sufficiency to do so.

This is a discipline I am trying to learn. It isn’t easy. It goes against my natural instincts. It could be compared to lying down on a mountain path when convinced a bear is in hot pursuit. The daily practice of dying, however, is what purifies me and allows me to experience Christ living in me. Will it ever be easier and less painful to take up my cross? Not as long as any part of my SELF is still living! Death will always be death, just like a bear will always be a bear, at least as far as my perceptions are concerned.

Read on.

The following year our family traveled to Yellowstone National Park. As we drove through the park we were inundated with posters and fliers warning of bears. Campers were urged to make excessive noise to keep bears away or to “play dead” if a bear was encountered.

It seemed that soft-sided campers like ours were especially vulnerable because of the food cooked and stored inside. With that in mind, we took many precautions as we prepared our campsite. Our middle son, Tristan, frightened by all of the bear talk, begged to sleep in the van. We conceded, and soon we were sleeping soundly.

Later, a loud r-r-r-r-r-i-p sat me upright as John’s feet hit the floor. Grabbing a pan from the stove, I frantically banged on it with the lid (I certainly made excessive noise!). Meanwhile, John struggled to shove the bear’s paw out of the camper and re-close the opening it had made.

Somehow, above all the commotion, a small voice was heard. “Mom...Dad...it’s me! I just want back in the camper!” The rip had been the sound of Velcro separating as our son reached inside to unlock the door. After calming all three boys, now traumatized by our frenzy, my husband and I fell into each others' arms breathless, hearts pounding. I’m not sure we slept at all the remainder of that night.

I have yet to encounter a real bear. If I do I will most likely die as I run, clamor, and plead for my life, because pleading for life is as natural as breathing. Although my bear illustrations are humorous, the matter of dying to self is not. It is a daily struggle, a test of my true devotion to the one who gave up His life for me. This, then, is my prayer:

Father, please use my foolishness and my fear to remind me how much I desire to live, so that each and every day I will remember to die!


*Luke 9:23-34 New American Standard Version
**Fenelon, Let Go, (Whitaker House, 1973), p.7.