As I See It: The King, The Seeker, and the Sage -- Part 3

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When we connect to the hearts of others, magic happens. Wonder blossoms Tears of compassion and joy flow. Inspiration explodes. The world listens. . . It is said, the shortest distance between the mind and the heart is story.

Ted Dekker, Author

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The King, The Seeker, and the Sage -- Part 3

The king had been isolated from his beloved people by the Code of the King enforcers. They had erected their barricade of books before the open door to the castle. One subject after another had become willing slaves to the Code. Making their livelihood as Code Keepers, it was their righteous job to burdened seeker peasants down by piling the rules on their back.

From a meadow some distance away, the seeker sadly shook his head. Those stubborn prophets and priests of the Code had no idea the king was not in the palace behind them.

For these merchants of the Code, business was great. It mattered little whether the king was in residence or not. They were in a profitable battle to banish the Doubter, assuming they had the blessing of their reagent.

Away from the cacophony of Code keepers, the seeker was surrounded by his new flock. Peasants and paupers, the lame and the unloved, all seemed drawn to him in the hills around the alabaster city.

At first it was but a trickle of humanity. Soon all who were hungry of heart were drawn to this new shepherd in the pastoral lands.

He looked like any other seeker-shepherd. He smelled like other seekers. What drew men and beast to him was his heart for being a shepherd of more than the mind and body. This seeker seemed to truly value them more than the wool, meat, and profit his flock could bring.

The seeker shared his love for all who listened. Threaded through his stories of life with the lambs, the seeker talked about how the ancient king loved his flock, as well as the flock of doubting subjects.

As the seeker’s flock grew, so did the confusion between the words fed to them by this shepherd and what they had eaten at the tables of the the chefs of the Code. That left them with an aftertaste of fear, despair, and lingering hunger. A meal with the seeker left stomachs full, hearts overflowing with joy, and a confidence in their shepherd’s knowledge of the Ancient King.

At first, the Keepers of the King’s Code shrugged off the seeker off as a country bumpkin.

“He’s unschooled in the Ways of the Code. How could a sentimental lamb-lover understand the high ways of the Ancient Monarch?” They scoffed, “why would anyone so majestic as our King, lower himself to value the opinion of one who pulls thistles from the tangled wool of ewes?”

When the seeker was told of their ridicule, he only smiled. He went on to speak of life within the palace walls and of the heart of the king in a way his flock longed for more. Even greater was the hunger and thirst swelling in the hearts of this growing human flock to know a king who had been held at a distance from them for so long.

To the dismay of the Code Keepers, the flock of the shepherd grew ever larger, drawn from even within the walls of the Ancient City. Their ridicule was replaced fear. These foolish sheep had littered the heart of the city with discarded Code books fallen from their backs. That rural buffoon was a rising brigand. Their shorn sheep were becoming his flock.

The Order of the Monarchy was in peril! Undoubtedly, the king would reign his wrath of displeasure upon them. With no personal knowledge of their king, the concepts of love, tenderness and relationship taught by the seeker was beyond the Code Keepers’ experience or comprehension. The Code the scribes had invested their lives in called for respect, awe, fear and wrath to keep the realm running.

Order must be restored!

The Doubter was grinning from his perch on the city wall. Wearing his coat of invisibility, he had maneuvered unseen, sowing his seeds of pride in the path before the scribes, priests, and prophets. Watered by their self-importance, fertilized by their arrogance, these seeds had sprouted to ensnare the egos and extremities of the enforcers of the Code.

Under a cloak of darkness and deceit, keepers of the Code bribed a doorkeeper of the seeker’s sheepfold. In an overwhelming display of force, they kidnapped the seeker, beat him, and drug him before the captain of the king’s guard. “Treason” they shouted in unison, until the captain believed this deluded shepherd was a threat to his station as Protector of the Castle.

Eager to dispose of this pest, the Captain ordered the words Traitor and Liar branded into the seeker’s forehead. Allowing the crowd to abuse the shepherd, the captain’s men drug him to the rack of Deceit outside the city walls. Feeling a need to defend the king, self-righteous men had built this rack as a public intimidation to all who would defy the Code of the King.

The Doubter strolled atop the white walls of the Ancient City. His arms were folded. A smug look of satisfaction was painted across his face. Taking a seat atop the rack, Doubter stared down at the battered, bloody face of the seeker.

Anguish now twisted the shepherd’s kind features. He shivered as words of doubt slithered from the Doubter’s mouth to linger in the air around his ear. Pain and rejection were now a plowed field ready for these seeds of distrust.