Agathos, The Rocky Island, and Other Stories

by Chris Wright

  Agathos, meanwhile, was sleeping soundly in his tent after being on duty all night. In a dream he saw the prince standing before him, his hands and feet deeply wounded with the marks of nails. Underneath the prince lay the terrible enemy. Both had been severely injured in the fight, but the prince was victorious.

  Agathos woke suddenly to hear the cries of his comrades and the terrifying roar of the dragon as it hurled itself into the camp. Agathos had always expected such an attack, which is why he wore his sandals at all times, and laid his armour beside his bed. He sprung to his feet and put it on. Then he fixed his sharp sword to his side and put his arm through the handle of his shield. Agathos was ready for battle.

  At the door of his tent, Agathos called on the king for strength, and then rushed forward. When the dragon saw him coming, it left off fighting the other soldiers and moved over to slay this soldier wearing the king's armour.

  Agathos used his shield to protect himself from the fiery darts. Although he was beaten to his knees more than once, new strength came to him, and he quickly regained his feet and fought bravely against the merciless foe.

  The battle was still raging as the sun went down. The good soldier was well nigh exhausted when he gathered his strength for one mighty blow. Calling aloud on the name of the prince, Agathos attacked the creature of evil so fiercely that it fled away.

  As Agathos knelt to give thanks and praise, over the battlefield he could see the prince coming to him among the evening dew. He heard the prince's voice and saw his face.

  "Well done, good and faithful servant," the prince said. "Come with me to my father's home."

  When Agathos looked at the wounds in the hands and feet of the prince, he knew his dream had indeed been true.

  "You are weary," the prince continued. "My father has a garden with a river as clear as crystal. Trees grow beside it, and their leaves will heal and revive you. Come to the home I have prepared for you."

  Then Agathos was glad he had remained faithful to the king. Already the heat of the day and the fight with the evil enemy seemed like a fading dream. Soon he would meet with the loving king.

  Epilogue

  A scary story, and one that we must take as a great warning. Peter in the New Testament writes that God's enemy, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, but we needn't be afraid if we keep close to Jesus. Paul tells us about the armour we must wear if we are to live a strong Christian life. So let's be like Agathos, not like the careless soldiers who thought there was no need to bother.

  Some Bible verses:

  [Paul wrote] Be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might. Put on the full armour of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.

  Therefore, take up the full armour of God, so that you will be able to resist in the evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm.

  Stand firm therefore, having girded your loins with truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace; in addition to all, taking up the shield of faith with which you will be able to extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

  With all prayer and petition pray at all times in the Spirit, and with this in view, be on the alert (Ephesians 6:10-18).

  COBWEBS

  Original story by Margaret Gatty

  Twinette the spider was young and she was hungry. "It is time for you to weave yourself a web, my dear," her mother said one day. "Then you can catch flies for yourself. Only do not weave near me, for I am old and I like to stay in the corners where you will be in my way. Scramble away to a little distance off, and there you can spin. But make sure there is nothing below you before you begin. You will not catch anything to eat unless there is empty space for the flies to fly about in."

  Twinette scrambled along a beam inside the church roof -- for it was there that she lived with her mother -- until she had gone what she thought might be a suitable distance. Then she stopped to look round. Considering she had eight eyes to look with, this was not difficult. But she was not so sure what might be below.

  "I wonder if Mother would say there is nothing below me but empty space for flies about to fly in?" said she to herself. So she went back to her mother and asked her what she thought.

  "Oh dear, oh dear!" her mother said. "How can I think about what I don't see? There was nothing there in my younger days, I am sure, but everybody must find out for themselves. Let yourself down by your web and see if there is anything there or not."

  Twinette thanked her mother for this advice, and was just moving away when another thought struck her. "How shall I know if there's anything there?" she asked.

  "Dear me, if there is anything there, how can you help but see it?" her mother cried, irritated by her daughter's inquiring spirit. "You, with all those eyes in your head!"

  "Thank you. Now I understand," Twinette said. Then scuttling back to the end of the beam, she began to prepare her long line of web.

  It was the most exquisite thing in the world -- so fine you could scarcely see it; so elastic it could be blown about without breaking; such a perfect grey that it looked white against black things, and black against white; so manageable that Twinette could both make it with her spinnerets and travel down it all at once. And when she wished to get back, she could climb it and roll it up at the same time.

  It was a wonderful silk line for anybody to make. But Twinette was not conceited. Line-making came naturally to her. She was about halfway down to the stone-flagged floor when she stopped to rest.

  Balancing herself at the end of her line, with her legs crumpled up round her, she spoke to herself. "This is charming. It's all so nice here in the middle. Nice empty space for the flies to fly about in, and a very pleasant time they must have of it. Dear me, how hungry I feel. I must go back and weave my web at once."

  Just as Twinette was preparing to roll up her silk line and be off, a ray of sunshine streamed through one of the windows and lit her suspended body -- startling her with its dazzling brightness. Everything seemed in a blaze around her, and she turned round and round in terror.

  "Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear!" she cried, for she did not know what else to say. Then, making a great effort, she gave one hearty spring, and blinded though she was, shot up to the roof as fast as a spider could go, rolling her silk line into a ball as she went. Once safely up, she stopped to grumble.

  But it was dull work grumbling to herself, so she ran back to her mother in the corner.

  "Back again so soon, my dear?" the old lady asked, not over-pleased at the fresh disturbance.

  "That I'm back at all is a wonder," Twinette whimpered. "There's something down there, after all!"

  "Why, what did you see?" her mother asked.

  "Nothing. That was just it," Twinette answered. "I could see nothing for this dazzle and blaze."

  "Young people today are very troublesome with their observations," her mother remarked. "However, did this thing you call dazzle and blaze push you out of your place, my dear?"

  Twinette said, "Certainly not. I came away by myself."

  "Then how could there be anything in the same place as you?" her mother asked. "Two things cannot be in the same place at the same time."

  Twinette sat very silent, wondering what dazzle and blaze could be if it was nothing at all. This was a question that might have puzzled her forever. Fortunately her mother interrupted by advising her to go and make a large web, for she really could not afford to feed Twinette out of her own web any longer.

  "If dazzle and blaze kill me, you'll be sorry, Mother," Twinette complained.

  "Nonsense about dazzle and blaze," the old spider cried, now thoroughly roused. "All you saw was b
right light."

  So Twinette scuttled off in silence. She dared not ask what bright light was made from, though she wanted very much to know.

  But she felt too cross to begin to spin a large web. Even though she was hungry, she preferred to search after truth rather than catch dinner, which showed she was no ordinary spider. So she resolved to go down below again and see if she could find a truly empty space.

  She lowered herself a little further, and a very satisfactory journey she seemed to make.

  "All is well so far," she said to herself, her good humour returning. "I do believe I've found nothing at last. How fine it is."

  As she spoke, she hung dangling at the end of her long silk line, her legs tucked up round her as before, in perfect enjoyment. Suddenly the door of the church was thrown open. It was a windy evening, and the draught that poured in blew the silk line, with Twinette at the end of it, backwards and forwards through the air until she felt quite dizzy.

  "Oh dear, oh dear," she cried. "What shall I do? How could anyone say there's nothing here, oh dear, but empty space for flies to fly about in?"

  At last, with much self-control, she succeeded in coiling up her line and hauled herself back to the church roof. She decided that her mother had no idea what she was talking about when she spoke of empty space with nothing in it.

  Twinette scrambled along to her mother and told her what she thought, though not in plain words.

  "If dazzle and blaze is nothing," Twinette cried at last, "how were we together in the same place? And down there I have found something else that is nothing, though it blows me out of my place twenty times in a minute. What is the use of believing things you cannot rely on, Mother? I don't think you know a quarter of what is down below!"

  The old spider's head turned giddy with Twinette's line of reasoning, just as Twinette's head had done while she was swinging in the wind. "I cannot see it matters what is down there," she grumbled, "as long as there is room for flies to fly about in. I wish you would go back and spin."

  But Twinette dawdled and thought, and thought and dawdled, until the day was nearly over.

  "I will go down just once more," said she to herself at last, "and look around again."

  And so she did, but this time she went even further. Halfway down she stopped to rest as usual. Presently, as she hung dangling in the air by her line, she grew braver. "I will find the end of it all," she thought. "I will see how far empty space goes." So saying, she continued spinning her long line of silk.

  It was a wonderful line, certainly, or it would not have gone on to such a length without breaking. In a few minutes Twinette was on the floor. But she disliked the feel of the cold stone under her eight feet and began to run as fast as she could. Luckily she met with a step of woodwork on one side.

  Still keeping hold of her long line of web, she hurried up the step and crept into a corner close by, where she stopped to take a breath. "One doesn't know what to expect in such strange places," she observed. "When I have rested I will go back, but I must wait until I can see a little better."

  But seeing a little better was out of the question, for night was coming. So when she became weary of waiting, Twinette stepped out of her hiding place to look round. The whole church was in darkness!

  Now it is one thing for a spider to be snug in bed when it is dark, and quite another to be a long way from home and have lost your way. Twinette had often been in the dark corner with her mother, and thought nothing of it. But now she shook all over with fright, and wondered what sort of dreadful thing darkness could be. Then she thought of her mother's ideas of these things being nothing, and it made her angry.

  "I cannot see anything, and I cannot touch anything," she murmured. "And yet there is something here, and it frightens me out of my wits."

  At last her anxiety made her bold. She had her line, safe and sound. Roll went the line, and up went Twinette; higher, higher, higher through the dark night air -- seeing nothing, hearing nothing, feeling nothing but the desperate fear within. By the time she reached the roof she was exhausted and quickly fell asleep.

  It must have been late next morning when she woke to the sound of organ music pealing through the church. The air vibrations swept pleasantly over her body, the music swelling and sinking like waves of the sea.

  Twinette went down on her silk line to observe, but could see nothing that would account for her sensations. Fresh feelings, however, stole round her as she hung suspended, for it was a harvest festival and large white lilies were grouped with evergreens round the pillars. They filled the air with their powerful perfume, yet nothing disturbed Twinette from her place. Sunshine streamed in through the windows -- she even felt it warm on her body -- but it interfered with nothing else.

  Meanwhile, in such a way as spiders hear, Twinette became aware of singing and prayer. A door opened and a breeze caught her line. But she held fast. So music and prayer and sunshine and breeze and scent were all there together. And Twinette was among them, and saw flies flying all around her.

  This was enough. She went back to the roof, chose a home and began to spin. Before evening, she had completed enough of her web to catch her first fly, which she feasted on. Then she cleared the remains away and sat down to think.

  As she crossed and twisted and wove new threads to increase the size of her web, her ideas grew clearer and clearer. Each line she fastened brought its own understanding.

  "Two or three things can be in the same place at the same time." This part of the web seemed a little loose until she tightened it by a second line. "Sound and sunshine and wind don't drive each other out of their places." That held firm. "When one has feelings, there must be something to cause them, whether one sees it or not."

  This was a wonderful thread. It went right round the web and was fastened down in several places.

  "Light and darkness and sunshine and wind and sound and feelings and fright and pleasure don't keep away flies." She paused for breath. The interlacing threads looked strong as she placed them so carefully. "There must be so many things here that I don't know much about." The web got larger by the minute. "And there may be so many things beyond -- ever so many things."

  Twinette kept repeating these words until she finished her web. When she sat down after supper to think, she began to repeat them again -- for she could think of nothing better or wiser to say. But this was no wonder, for all her thoughts put together made nothing but a cobweb, after all.

  And when one day the broom swept her web with others from the church roof, Twinette was no longer there. She had died and handed down her cobweb-wisdom to another generation. But it was only cobweb-wisdom after all, for spiders remain spiders still. They weave their webs in the roofs of churches without understanding the mystery of unseen things on Earth -- and the unseen mysteries of Heaven that even people cannot understand.

  Epilogue

  I used to think this story was about understanding the Trinity, the mystery of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. But reading it now, I think Margaret Gatty was simply writing about how difficult it is to understand so many things, both on Earth and in Heaven. In that way we are all like Twinette. Yet the story does help us understand a little about the Trinity. Think of God as the church building, and in it are the glorious sounds of the organ that fill the church (the Father), the dazzling light (Jesus, the Light of the World), and the wind (the Holy Spirit). So three things can be in the building, in the same place, at the same time -- and be separate and yet one. It's not a perfect picture, but it may help.

  Some Bible verses:

  "Holy, Holy, Holy, is the LORD of hosts, the whole earth is full of His glory" (Isaiah 6:3).

  Then Jesus again spoke to them, saying, "I am the Light of the world; he who follows Me will not walk in the darkness, but will have the Light of life" (John 6:12).

  [Jesus said] "Do not be amazed that I said to you, 'You must be born again.' The wind blows where it wishes and you hear the sound of it, but do not
know where it comes from and where it is going; so is everyone who is born of the Spirit" (John 3:7-8).

  [Jesus said] "I and the Father are one" (John 10:30).

  [Jesus said] "If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode with him (John 14:23).

  The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with you all (2 Corinthians 13:14).

  THE SPRING MORNING

  Loosely based on a story by Samuel Wilberforce

  It was a spring beautiful morning in the large gardens surrounding a fine house. I watched four young people laughing as they walked through the long grass. At last they paused to rest by a gentle river that ran along the bottom of the garden, and refreshed themselves with wild strawberries that grew on its banks.

  Suddenly they looked up from their eating as a man came through the trees bordering the garden.

  "Look, it's the prince!" they called out together.

  The man sat down in the shade and called the four around him. They appeared to know him, for they did not approach him as they would approach a stranger.

  "Edward, Oliver, Rachel and Charlotte, I know you are enjoying yourselves here," the man said quietly; "but you cannot stay much longer."

  "But it's so good," the boy called Edward said. "I don't want to leave."

  The prince shook his head. "It may look good to you, Edward, but believe me, by evening this garden will not be safe. The flowers will fade and the birds will sing no more. The water in the river will lose its freshness, and as the night grows darker you will see fierce eyes glaring out of the bushes."

  "We can always go into the house," Edward said.

  The prince shook his head. "There will be danger everywhere when night comes."

  The four looked around in disbelief. Surely this could not be true, they whispered to each other.

  The prince saw their faces and pointed into the distance. "Your real home is in that direction, with my father the king. Trust me. If you go there, you will be safe for ever."