Articles
Bucks Fighting
R E F L E C T I O N S
Thoughts on nature and the Christian faith
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"What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you?
Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you?"
- James 4:1
Fall, with its cooler weather and shorter days, sparks the annual rut of the white tail deer. Bucks fight among themselves to establish dominance over lesser bucks and for the privilege of selecting which females to pursue. As the temperatures drop, the hormones rise. Caution gives way to passion. When I photographed these two bucks, it was the smaller buck who instigated the fight, but it was the larger buck who put a quick end to it. During most of the year, the bucks remain mainly peaceful, but when their passions are stirred in the fall, the fights begin. In a way, deer behave much better than we humans do because we have to fight our passions all year long. And we have little success controlling them. Scripture groups our passions as the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. Any honest appraisal of how well we control these passions should shame us all. Even the great apostle Paul had to confess that the good he desired to do he did not do, and the evil he did not want to do was what he kept on doing. Passions often override logic. Some people say that when a person becomes a Christian, these struggles will end. But in truth, that is when they begin. Only a Christian will experience the conflict between what we should be and what we often are. This process of controlling our passions is a ongoing battle, a battle that we never had before we came to Christ. It should make us humble. It should make us forgiving. It should allow us to empathize with those fighting the same battles. Deer battle for control over other deer. Christians battle for control over ourselves. Our battle is definitely much harder. - John
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