Prayers and Prophetic Dreaming...the courier and the tinder

A few more, God, that You've designated for me. What they mean I hardly know, but that You've drawn attention to these things, I'll lift back to you in prayer...

There is one marked as a courier. For his sake, I considered the meaning of the term:

cou·ri·er
noun
Etymology:
Middle French courrier, from Old Italian corriere, from correre to run, from Latin currere
Date:
1579
1: messenger: as a: a member of a diplomatic service entrusted with bearing messages b (1): an espionage agent transferring secret information (2): a runner of contraband c: a member of the armed services whose duties include carrying mail, information, or supplies 2: a traveler's paid attendant; especially : a tourists' guide employed by a travel agency

In whatever way this one is to prove to be a courier, guide him to that role and fulfill Your purpose in him.

More seemingly pressing at the moment are prayers for the one classified as tinder for a fire that is a refining fire that will visit my place of work and lines up with verses I've already quoted here regarding the soap and fire prophecy of Malachi. I've seen the tinder call on this person for a couple of months, but am now finding You rain that redundancy idea upon us again. Both Scott and I dreamed we were repairing a car last night. He dreamed it was a random young man's car, but I dreamed it was this particular young man, which makes sense as I know this particular young man better than my husband does as he works where I work. And as my dreams of vehicles are literally that: an image to portray the idea of getting moving, not being stalled out but making forward progress...I returned to the idea again of tinder. I looked it up, too:

Tinder is easily combustible material used to ignite fires by rudimentary methods. A small fire consisting of tinder is then used to ignite kindling. Anything that can be ignited by a match can be considered tinder. Whichever material is used, the thinner it is and the more surface there is, and especially edges, the more easily it will ignite. With wood, this can be achieved by shaving slivers off it. One method to keep these together is to make a feather stick. The best wood from a tree is dead branches that haven't fallen to the ground yet. (from WIkipedia)

I also found this:
Wilderness Survival
Fire - Tinder

Tinder is the crucial middle link between a coal (such as that produced by a bow drill) and actual flames. Tinder is made from materials that catch a spark readily, or to which a coal can be added, and which can then be blown into a flame to actually start a fire. (from http://wildwoodsurvival.com/survival/fire/tinder/index.html...pic from there also.)

Finally, researching tinder also led me to a more abstract reference in acomputer science application for something called Campfire. http://campfirenow.com/

What is Campfire?
Campfire is a web-based group chat tool that lets you set up password-protected chat rooms in just seconds. Invite a client, colleague, or vendor to chat, collaborate, and make decisions. Link to a room on your intranet for internal communications.

And in that application, Tinder is the unofficial Campfire API, which is "An application programming interface (API) is a set of declarations of the functions (or procedures) that an operating system, library or service provides to support requests made by computer programs. (as per Wikipedia again.)

More interesting info about API's that might be worth considering in this highly symbolic representation for the idea of tinder as an API, even as an unofficial one:

Distinction between specification and its implementation
The software that provides the functionality described by an API is said to be an implementation of the API. The API itself is abstract, in that it specifies an interface and the behavior of the identifiers specified in that interface; it does not specify how the behavior may be implemented.

Release policies
There are two general kinds of API publishing policies that are often encountered:
Some companies protect information on their APIs from the general public. For example, Sony used to make its official PlayStation 2 API available only to licensed PlayStation developers. This enabled Sony to control who wrote PlayStation 2 games. Such control can have quality control benefits and potential license revenue.
Some companies make their APIs freely available. For example, Microsoft makes the Microsoft Windows API public and Apple releases its APIs Carbon and Cocoa so that software can be written for their platform.

Whatever is on Your Mind and Heart, O God, I'm listeneing. We're both (my husband and me) willing to "fix the car" (incidentally, this young man's car actually did die on him last spring and to my knowledge remains unrepaired.) Show us why You gave us these dreams and make a straight path for us in serving Your purposes that Your Son's name might be more fully revealed!

Amen.

The Warrior Makes His Choice...

Chehas assigned a wizened man--
these days butler more in title than function--
to escort the Warrior to the palace gates.

But with each step he took, a certainty swelled
in his breast
that he left prematurely.
And even as he thought it,
the old man before him said,
"So you'd leave her then?"

And the warrior heard in the man a voice
he'd heard before,
the same old man
who made him apostle years before,
made him as one sent to find that queen of the forest
many years before.
"Old man, do you never age and die?"
His words might bristle rude,
were they not rife with incredulity,
making the old man chuckle.

"Aye, a person can do that but once," he said sagely,
"But what of this question of a maiden?"

The Warrior shook his head.
"She's the daughter of a king, no doubt.
Who am I to drag her into warfare?
I'd keep her far from me,
lest my enemies become hers."

"Ye'd do better in that protecting if ye'd finish with this training first,"
the old man advised.
The man looked long over his shoulder.
Decisively, he said, "No.
It would not be good
to drag her life alongside the life
I am called to live."

"Ah, but is this not truth:
that sometimes the point is not so much
to make a show of goodness as
to make a show
of faithfulness?"

The Warrior paused fully, considering these last words.
Entertaining a hope of joy as bedfellow to the strain of war.
The old man spoke one last time.
"Don't turn away from her. She'll yet preserve ye."

So the warrior retraced his steps,
faster and faster across the plaza,
until he came to the place where her footprint
trod the garden grasses flat.
Running now, he caught her,
twirled her around
and embraced her.
"Stay here,"
he said, even as she had.
She smiled.
"Alright," and folding her arms
she leaned her back against a sturdy oak tree.

He stepped away a bit, muttering as one does
when scavenging for some certain item.

Soon he returned, a garland of his own in his hands.
She laughed.
"Some would say you offer me a garland of weeds!"

He grinned, "Indeed, the gardener had pulled them.
Cast them off to be burned.
They'll wilt soon, but for now know this:
in my land these weeds represent a love returned
and immortality.
Fitting gift from the hand of a warrior:
a life of weeds but that speaks of eternal love."

Her smile turned soft
as the deepest petal of a full-blown rose.
She took the garland and put it gently on her own head.
"It is time you met my father."

The Warrior's Training Seems to End

"You see now why it is funny
you called me Sweet Water,"
said the young woman,
sweeping her arms wide,
"considering this City is my Home."

They had marched quite a journey
to come to this place where water and sky
competed for recognition
as Keeper of the Bright and the Blue.

Lighthouses, like stiff red ribbons,
cut into the sky;
and tall sturdy buildings
yellow as a frosty dawn
stood solidly braced, surpported
by columns of towering white.

"It is a bright city,"
the man observed as they walked its streets.
Tthe woman nodded.
"This time of year, yes."
And she thought for a moment before adding,
"She takes this season to beg our pardon for the winters she gives
--when all is grey, and for many months at that--
when it is winter."

She stopped and looked up at one large building
a monolith 'longside its neighbors.
She said, "Here we are."

The man perused the architecture.
"Many windows I see,
tall, narrow windows.
And not an arm's breadth betwixt a pair of them."

"True enough," agreed the woman.

"So why do I think this palace
still promises heavy darkness in its interior?"

She studied him strangely and smiled.
"Shall we see if it speaks truth to you?"

Inside the palace,
the woman was suddenly
known.
And those who went about their business in that place
--though they ignored the man entirely--
showed deference to this one woman.

And the warrior-to-be began to harbor
that besetting thought again:
Maybe I'll meet someone
-- influential--through her
after all.

But she merely took him to stand in a dark corner
facing a meeting of two stone walls, a place
where interior mists hung long into the day-hours
free of the burn of sunlight,
for the palace indeed proved dark
and almost mossy.

"Why are we in this corner?"
he asked.

"We are here to see what I brought you to see.
Be relieved, for I was afraid we might not find
such as her.
Lately, those hired to keep things pure and clean
do quite a thorough job of running her off,
though they fail entirely
to drive away mist and mustiness.
You were right, were you not?"

"What in the world are we talking about?"
the man cried, scanning the walls
growing frustrated,
realizing his fantasies of meeting
some diplomat
or general were even yet
dreams unrealized.

"Look and see--" she pointed with a jerk of her hand.
So the man peered.
Then squinted, and peered harder.
"All I see is a cobweb with a small spider ruling over it."

"And high upon the wall she is, too! Though a lizard would have served as well."
And the maiden sighedg contently.
"Well, that's it then.
You have seen the four counselors."

"How can you say that?"
He'd grown quite emphatic.
"How can you say you've fulfilled your promise
to introduce me to those who would train me well
for success in warfare.
Where is the warrior who would teach me the ways
to go up against a foe?"

"You balk?
Indeed, you know more than you realize.
You think all counselors must teach with words?
You think all must demonstrate deeds
already translated?
And do you think all learners will only learn from their own kind?"

They walked silently to an opening,
a portico that opened onto
a formal garden.

"Now will you consider what the four have shown you?" she pleaded.

"Well..." the man finally chose to engage in her game.
"The conies are weak animals,
as far as warfare goes.
They could hardly prove victorious against any predators,
but their strength is in their fortress--
living in the stones as they do."

"Yes," said the woman,
and the beginning of a smile
sparkled in the word.

"A single ant is likewise powerless
but in great numbers
and with much of their work done
in places unoccupied and unobserved
by others,
he is not often bothered by enemies."

"Yes, again," she said.

"One locust is easy prey,
but a swarm of them can destroy a village
and not by attacking an enemy per se, rather
by destroying the food of his future."

"Is there more from this small creature you would learn?"

"I would note this:
one locust is easy prey,
so what to do should the head locust be killed?
Are all lost?
Nay, for all locusts are as the head, in a sense.
Together they read the signs,
and when they perceive a reaching,
a magic number,
all lift as a unit.
And swarm to their destiny.
The loss of one is of no effect
on the whole."

He glanced back at the dark palace interior
from their stance on the sunny marble plaza.
"As for the spider.
She too is small and easily killed."
Then he smiled a secret smile.
"But, she is small and unobtrusive,
often colorless, and her web is nigh invisible.
Shecan just as easily make her home on the wall
of a king as a pauper.
And this is strength indeed!"
So the warrior to be realized, quite suddenly, that
he had much to consider
about the strength surrounding weakness,
a strength often neglected
by warriors of more common fare.
"How do you know such things?"
he turned a more humble eye upon the maiden,
seeing for the first time she was not so young
after all.
Youth floated filmy around her--
or maybe agelessness--
and her smiling eyes could have seen many years.
He began to raise comment, when
at that moment,
a serving maid, one carrying a crystal pitcher,
paused to bow to this woman who had been his guide.

"Do I state your bein wrong in calling you
Sweet Water, when you should be called
Lady Spider?" he asked, almost winking.
So she laughed.
"You may use my given name.
Chehas."
Then she glanced over her shoulder, and
taken with a sudden fancy--
one sparked by a breath of breeze
wafting verdant garden fragrance
across the plaza tiles.
"Wait here.
I'll be right back."

He waited while she scampered into the garden.
He studied the palace balconies,
the people's coming and going
along the dim recesses.
None paid him any regard.
Nor did he expect any,
until he began to wonder if she'd forgotten him, too,
when suddenly she scampered out of the brush.
A garland dangled loosely
from her hand.

"It is my expectation," she explained.
Layin her fingers on each flower
with singular attention, she said,
"Yarrow at the base of all, for it is the flower of war.
"But it entwined with oak leaves, the indicator of bravery."
Then touching a subtle blue berry, "Juniper for protection.
Mint to mark your virtue."
Then after taking a deep nasal breath, she smiled,
"And the sweetness of chamomile to renew you energy
even in adversity."

She reached her arms up,
and soon he saw a fringe of flowers
just above his eyebrows.
"May the truth of this garland mark thee well,"
she gifted him, and blessed him and bid him farewell.