Dancing Dragonflies


….they delight in doing everything the Lord wants; day and night they think about his law. They are like trees planted along the riverbank, bearing fruit each season without fail. Their leaves never wither, and in all they do, they prosper. Psalm 1:2-3

I have heard it said in Hong Kong that when there are many dragonflies around it is a sign that there is a typhoon (tropical storm) in the area. I don’t know if that is true but an abundance of these large insects – happily they are harmless – does often seem to coincide with pre-typhoon conditions. When my sister-in-law was visiting recently she was fascinated with our dragonflies, but it was the weekend after they left that we had the most amazing display from them.

Colin and I sat one morning and watched them with fascination. Possibly a dozen or so of them did their aerial dance over our glass-topped patio table. The attraction for them seemed to be little pools of water on the table top which had been left by the overnight showers. They danced and dipped, danced and dipped; again and again dipping to drink of the water. We got tired of watching them long before they finished drinking.

This reminded me of how the Christian life should be for us. There is much ‘dancing’ to be done with ministry responsibilities and opportunities constantly knocking at our doors, but we need to remember to drink of the life-giving water from God’s well. Just as the human body needs water to function effectively, so our spirits need God’s refreshing from His word and from being in His presence often.

I know that camels can store up much water and go for long distances without water and sometimes we may find ourselves in a position where we need to work hard with little time to draw deeply from God, but that should be the exception rather than the rule. What we are doing in life, whether secular or spiritual is all part of our life with God and we need to involve Him in it. This is a relationship with a person, it is not religion where we do our duty and go on our merry way to ‘do our own thing’. Our lives need to be in constant communion and communication with God.

We will be much more productive and effective if we constantly draw on the Spirit of God for strength and refreshing. That is what Jesus meant when he spoke about abiding in the vine. If we learn to do that then there is a constant ‘water’ supply. Much better than traveling through a parched desert desperately looking for an oasis!

Prayer: Dear Father, help me to abide in you and draw water from your wells of life-giving water. Amen.