Out of the Frying Pan into the Fire

Since my teenage years, J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit has been one of my favorite books.  I am currently rereading it for what perhaps is the fifth time. Tolkien’s tale concerns a timid hobbit named Bilbo Baggins who loves food and hates adventures. Through the trickery of the wizard Gandalf, Bilbo finds himself on a journey with a band of dwarves who desire to retrieve their stolen gold from a fire-breathing dragon named Smaug. Frequently, the hobbit wishes for nothing more than to be back in the comfort of his home, enjoying the contents of his larder.

Chapter 6 is entitled “Out of the Frying-Pan into the Fire.” By this time, Bilbo, the dwarves, and the wizard already had encountered cannibal trolls, vicious goblins, the treacherous Gollum, and sinister wolves known as wargs. They were forced to climb trees to escape a joint goblin and warg attack, and the goblins set fire to the trees in order to smoke them out. Just at the fir trees began to topple, large, friendly eagles retrieved the heroes and flew them to their mountain-top nests. As Bilbo settled into a peaceful sleep that night, chapter 6 records his dream: “all night he dreamed of his own house and wandered in his sleep into all his different rooms looking for something that he could not find nor remember what it looked like.” 

Tolkien’s intention is to show that Bilbo greatly and permanently had changed during his journey. The hobbit had been comfortable with his old life until he became exposed to a new, better way of life. This transformation is reminiscent of what occurs when a person trusts in Jesus as Lord. 

Although we were comfortable with a sinful, destructive path, our walk with Christ shows us the fallacy of that destructive path, the reality of a joyous, present relationship with Him, and a future in His kingdom!

2:1 And you were dead in your trespasses and sins,  

2:2 in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience.           

 2:3 Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.                       

2:4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us,                 

 2:5 even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved),                      
 2:6 and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus,   

2:7 so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. (Ephesians 2:1-7)