Sightings

"Mom, you'll never guess what happened today," our son said as he and his dad came in from the farm. "Allison called me and said, 'Dad, the driveway is full of guineas!'"

"Wait, let me show you," he said, picking up his iPhone and clicking on a video. Wow! there were dozens of guineas! White ones, with a few grey ones in the mix, clacking noisily and creating quite a din as they rushed around, pecking in the grass of the corral pens.

"Where did they come from?" I asked. Then a thought occurred to me! Last year we had several guineas (our prizes we had nurtured from balls of fluff) that were among the flock of chickens that disappeared from their chicken yard. We assumed varmints had massacred and eaten them (though really there were only a few feathers on the ground), but maybe they escaped and survived, and this was their offspring!

"I gave them some corn," Howard announced. "I hope they stay around!" He had loved those young birds we had.

Imagine! Wild guineas! I know guineas are survivors. Some people even use them as watch dogs! Their loud clacking can be an alert system! The funny-looking fowl love to range far and wide in their searches for bugs and insects, roosting high in trees for safety.

All I could think of when I saw them was the 10 Lost Tribes of Israel! The Kingdom of Israel was conquered by the Assyrians about 700 BC, then assimilated into the population and lost to history as a people. The two tribes of Judah and Benjamin survived. Some people think the lost tribes theory is a myth, and much folklore has circulated about the lost tribes, with many people groups claiming identity with them.

However, one thing we know: God has promised to bring the Jews back to their homeland, the fulfillment of which began in 1948 when Israel became a nation. Isaiah 43:5 says, "Fear not, for I am with thee: I will bring thy seed from the east, And gather thee from the west." Never before have we seen so many Jews returning to Israel as in recent years. The culmination of this will be Jesus's Second Coming, which seems to Christians to be more imminent every day.

Jesus said, "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem,...how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!" Matthew 23:37.

My husband wanted to gather the guineas for safe keeping, but sadly for him, they were last seen running away in undergrowth along the highway. May we always be obedient to the Lord's calling and ready for His coming!