In
Jules Verne's novel The Mysterious Island, he tells of five men
who escape a Civil War prison camp by hijacking a hot-air balloon. As they rise into the air, they realize the
wind is carrying them over the ocean.
Watching their homeland disappear on the horizon, they wonder how much longer
the balloon can stay aloft.
As
the hours pass and the surface of the ocean draws closer, the men decide they
must cast overboard some of the weight, for they had no way to heat the air in
the balloon. Shoes, overcoats, and
weapons are reluctantly discarded, and the uncomfortable aviators feel their
balloon rise. But only temporarily. Soon they find themselves dangerously close
to the waves again, so they toss their food.
Better to be high and hungry than to drown on a full belly!
Unfortunately,
this, too, is only a temporary solution, and the craft again threatens to lower
the men into the sea. One man has an
idea: they can tie the ropes that hold
the passenger car and sit on those ropes.
Then they can cut away the basket beneath them. As they sever the very thing they had been
standing on, it drops into the ocean, and the balloon rises.
Not
a minute too soon, they spot land. Eager
to stand on terra firma once again, the five jump into the water and swim to
the island. They live, spared because
they were able to discern the difference between what really was needed and
what was not. The
"necessities" they once thought they couldn't live without were the
very weights that almost cost them their lives.
The writer to the Hebrews says, "Let us throw off
everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles." (Heb. 12:1, NIV)
-- Ed Haynes
#3655
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