When Survival Isn’t Enough... Chapter 5

He laid there, hardly daring to breathe, watching as the bear tore up the ground in huge chunks and buried its snout into the hole and devoured the remains of his fish dinner. From where he was he could see the unmistakable hump on the shoulders that told him it was a Grizzly. When it had finished it’s scavenged meal, the bear stood up on it’s hind legs and looked around, sniffing the air and bobbing its head from side to side. Fortunately, John was upwind from the bear and the debris hut where he was huddled was perfectly camouflaged with it’s surroundings. After a few moments, with another grunt, the bear dropped to all four legs and turning, went back into the forest and out of sight. He waited until the sounds of the bear crashing through the undergrowth had faded away and then crawled out of his shelter, adrenaline pumping and all thoughts of sleep gone.

He berated himself for not doing a better job of disposing the fish carcasses by burning them on his fire to ashes, but he had been in too much of a hurry to obtain wood for his hatchet handle. That one careless act had put him in danger for the bear now knew there was easy food in the area and would surely be back. He struggled to remember all he had learned about grizzlies and their ways. One thing that he remembered well was that bears are unpredictable and that they were never to be taken lightly. At least this one had been by itself and so was likely a lone male wandering around. He was just glad it wasn’t a female with cubs.

He fed sticks onto his fire and thought about his next move. He knew he needed sleep because he had been worn out from the previous day’s journey and labor, but at this moment he was too keyed up to get any rest. Looking at his watch he saw that it was nearly midnight. However, because of the latitude and time of year, the sun was still shining brightly.

He stayed by the fire for a couple of hours until he was convinced the bear wasn’t coming back and then got up and began to warily move around the campsite, picking up anything that might have a scent on it from his meals and putting it on the fire, including the boards that he had used to cook his fish on as well as his chopsticks. When this was done, he went to the nearby stand of trees and using his newly completed hatchet, chopped down a couple of decent sized dead standing Alders that were 7-8 inches in diameter.

After processing the wood down into decent sized logs about 12 feet long, he dragged them back to camp and stacked them carefully around his shelter beginning to build a log wall. Even though it offered scant protection against a bear, it still made him feel safer and if he could get enough of them he could use them as the beginning of the log structure that he wanted to begin as a more permanent shelter. During this time, he boiled some more water and set another full pot aside for later.

Satisfied with his work, he went back into the forest and spent the next several hours cutting down timber, chopping it into lengths and dragging them back to camp. When he had the log perimeter about head height, and now feeling extremely weary from his labors and lack of sleep, he carefully climbed over the wall as it had no doorway and settling in he tried to go to sleep. It was now nearly 9 AM in the morning and after a few moments, sheer exhaustion came over him and he fell into a nervous sleep.

Just like John, we often struggle with anxieties because of situations that are outside of our control and it’s easy to become paralyzed by fear. However, for the Believer, we have the promise of God’s constant promise that he “will never leave thee, nor forsake thee” Hebrews 13:5b So, you may not be stuck in a survival situation on the shore of a small lake in Alaska, but you may feel stuck in a situation that feels just as bad. It’s easy to feel despair and hopelessness. However, God’s love and Presence will be be with you and you can lean on Him for strength. Also, while you may not be able to change the exact circumstance that you are in, you can still make yourself useful and improve the parts of your situation that you do have control over. One of the best remedies for a troubled mind is to simply get to work. So, wherever you find yourself today, get up, get busy and get to trusting that God will work all things out for His Will and your good.

Thanks for reading!

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James B