The small town of Quilcene is just a few stores and homes huddled together at the base of the Olympic Mountains in the State of Washington. The steep slopes of these mountains are thickly covered with extremely tall evergreen trees. The beautiful mountain peaks are flecked with snow in summer and covered in deep snow in the winter. Most of these mountains are within the boundaries of the Olympic National Park, which covers thousands of square miles, and is just as wild as it was hundreds of years ago.
Hikers in the park often see wildlife such as bears, eagles and mountain goats. Cougars, or mountain lions, also live in the park, but they are rarely seen, as they like to keep their distance from humans. A person can hike in the mountains all their life and never see one of these beautiful animals.
However, one cougar recently left the park and wandered down the eastern slopes of the mountains looking for food. Cougar cubs usually stay with their mothers until they are 18 to 36 months old. During this time their mothers teach them how to hunt, along with other skills they need to survive. But for some reason, this young cougar, only about a year old, was on its own and not yet able to find the food it needed to stay healthy. As a matter of fact, it was starving. It only weighed about 35 pounds instead of the 100 pounds it should have weighed.
One night, it glided through the shadows of the buildings of Quilcene. Many a farmer or rancher in the area would have shot the cougar on sight if they had seen it prowling by their barns or stables.
As daylight approached, the cougar found what looked like a good place to rest. It saw an open gate to a large animal pen filled with hay. The weak cougar went in and made a nest in the hay.
Amazingly, the cougar had wandered into the one place where it would find the help it needed so badly. It had wandered into an animal rescue center! A worker there named Sara found the animal sleeping on the hay, and she saw at once how sickly and close to starving it was, almost ready to die. She took the little animal to a vet as quickly as possible, and it was so weak that it didn’t even fight them when they handled it. The vet gave it some shots and cleaned and bandaged some sores on its front leg. But Sara and the vet still thought the young cougar was so sick that it might not live, even with the very best care.
Sara took the cougar back to the animal rescue center, cared for it and made sure it had good food. For a few days she didn’t know if it was going to survive, but then it started putting on weight, and a week later it started snarling and growling whenever she approached its pen.
Sara was not upset about the cougar being angry and not appreciating all the care she gave it. She was happy, because she knew it was feeling better and acting like a healthy cougar would.
In Washington, cougars that are rescued cannot be released again into the wild, so Sara searched for a possible home for him. She found an animal refuge park in Florida that was willing to take him. She packed the little cougar up in an animal crate and shipped it to Florida, where he could live happily.
That young cougar wandering in the night, starving and unable to take care of itself, reminds me of what it’s like to be a lost sinner. Sinners are lost because their sins have taken them far from God. Sinners are hungry, too. I don’t mean hungry in their stomachs, but hungry in their hearts. They try to fill their hearts with things that were never meant to satisfy their heart hunger, but the more things they try, the emptier they feel.
Sinners also can’t take care of their sins on their own. They need someone bigger and stronger than themselves to take care of them. Thankfully, there is Someone who is ready to take care of every sinner! That Person is the Lord Jesus, who came to “seek and to save that which was lost” (Luke 19:1010For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost. (Luke 19:10)).
If you are a sinner, you don’t have to stay in sin’s darkness a moment longer. You may come to the Lord Jesus, who is the Savior of sinners, and put your trust in Him right now. He wants you to. He gave His life so He could save you from your sins. He is the One who will satisfy your heart. He said, “All that the Father giveth Me shall come to Me; and him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out” (John 6:3737All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. (John 6:37)). He will never turn you away if you come to Him!
Messages of God’s Love 6/20/2021