“Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look upon the earth beneath, for the heavens shall vanish like smoke, and the earth shall wax old like a garment worn thin, and all of us that dwell therein shall in like manner go the way of all flesh, some to eternal life, others? to the second death; bad place*. Oh, but for those who have come into the Covenant Land of the Deep Fetch through the Cross of Jesus Christ, covered in the Blood of the Lamb Slain, will live forever. “For of those”, the Lord says, “In My Righteousness, you will never be disowned.” (Isaiah 51:6 my emphasis)

¶ Our lives on earth are like unto the shadows of the low, fast-flying clouds driven by the buff and burley winds of March. The shadows of these clouds, like spirits, race across the fields in the spring of the year, disappear into the forest, and then they’re gone. As a young boy, here in Kentucky, in the spring of my years, I would chase them and race them barefoot across the fields and meadows of tender new grass to the edge of a vast, vintage forest where they would break into and scatter into a thousand little creatures I could not catch. They would dart about the forest floor snapping not a twig, scurry up and down and all about the massive trunks of that huge old timber, and flit through the finery of the great leafy bumbershoots that crowned that ancient society of grand old giants, disturbing not a critter on the ground nor a fine feathered friend resting from flight, or nesting in their heights, as they carried out their silent display of the spirit world. Then as quick as they appeared they would vanish, quicker than the twinkling of an eye, into some clandestine hide-out, leaving behind them a forest at rest neath a massive overhead canopy of greenery as varying and luminous as the diverse shades of fine-cut, Son-lit Emeralds, while scattered shafts of golden beams which had found their way thru the sparse openings in the great leaved crowns of those majestic old giants softly illuminated the forest floor below with flaxen hues of heavenly news, where, in all serenity, I stood in awe.

¶ I spent many a day in the days of my youth exploring the Forest of the Deep Fetch looking for that Clandestine Hideout where I was sure those fleeting little spirit creatures, made of shadows and light, went to slip off into that other realm. Oh, how I wanted to catch them doing that! As a boy, I was obsessed with the mysteries of creation hidden out there in the Forest of the Deep Fetch.

¶ As growing boys do, I did, day by day, grow more adventurous and after a few years, as they say here in Kentucky, of coming into my own, manning up a bit, I began to bravely work my way deeper, and deeper, into the heart of that vast forest, where, in the midst of it, I came across a curious clearing bathed in the soft, golden sun of summer where did glide a golden glade which fell off into a deep, green dell. Down across the gild of that glade lay a deep dell laced with meandering brooks of cool, pristine water. It was there that I knelt down to quench my thirst, and in that mirrored pool of cool pristine water – Why!!! – I beheld the face of an old man lookin’ back at me. I had grown old. The days of my youth, where did they go?  As the Scriptures say, “They vanished like smoke.”

The days of our years are three score and ten,

Like a slow movin’ freight, they’re soon round the bend.

Off in the distance that lone whistle lows

Like a ghost in the night, tell me, where did they go?

¶ Looking back through the years into those idyllic days of my youth, it was as though I had been led by a mysterious, yet pleasant, even amiable Spirit into the Forest of the Deep Fetch. You see, the shadows of those low, swift-moving clouds that I raced across the meadow were but the Shade of my Father’s Right Hand fetching me into the Forest of the Deep Fetch where I was gifted with a burning curiosity, far beyond anything natural, for the intriguing surroundings in the midst of which I found myself, you know, this “mysterious thing” called Creation. I had eyes that longed to see into the Deep Fetch, and I did learn to see into it, I just couldn’t see beyond the drapes of its beautiful shadowy shades and stormy veil into that other realm. I yearned with an overwhelming hankering to look deeper into the mysteries of this thing that abounded all about me, and perhaps even meet the One Who put it all together. Don’t you know He had to like us a lot, maybe even love us, to put all this together, then to put us here, right smack-dab in the middle of it all. Because of this burning curiosity, my young soul would not rest day nor night. I had to find the hidden entrance into that Secret Place, where perhaps, I might become acquainted with those friendly little creatures that knew Him, for I was sure they were somehow related to that likable, Greathearted Spirit, whose bright clouds and fleeting shadows, that as a boy, I would race and chase across that meadow and into that mysterious forest. Perhaps someday “what I was Fetching after would Fetch me.” And, in turn, “I would follow hard after IT and Fetch what Fetched me!” (Philippians 3:12)  Why, perhaps, we could even become friends.

¶ And so, after quenching my thirst at that pristine pool down there in the Dell of the Deep Fetch, I fetched my cane and made my way back toward the old homestead, for the late afternoon was coming on and in a few hours evening would begin to fall. In a slow, genteel demeanor, I worked my way back through the brook-laced meadow, up out of the dell, through the glen, and through the dale up into that vintage forest. As the light of day began to fade and the long afternoon shadows mingled with the soft, golden beams of early evening the old Forest of the Deep Fetch began to flourish with memories – memories that, though aery and somewhat shy to show themselves slowly came alive right before my eyes. It seemed as though a hundred years had passed in one day. And, although Time is a gift, Time is, indeed, a fickle friend. In one of the exceptionally long, and lingering evening shadows that seemed to reach a little further back into the past than the others, I saw myself at 16 years of age being drawn away out of the Forest of the Deep Fetch by the Pied Piper of this World and his beguiling, Phantasmagorical Magic Lantern Show. I think he came up from Mexico, or maybe from out in L.A.  Honestly, for all I know he might have been a Gypsy from Romania. He was different! He’d come by once or twice a year, setting up his tent out on the edge of a town not too far from our old homestead. Not only could this Pied Piper pipe, he could play that guitar. His Magic Lantern Show was bewitchingly gripping. Why it could project a very convincing image, although a bit ghostly, of the Hidden Entrance into that Secret Place (how he knew about it, I don’t know) out onto a thing he called the Broad Highway, alluding to the fact that I could step thru it at any time if I would just man-up a little bit more. The secret to stepping through it, he said, was simply mustering up enuff courage to man-up and take on the character of a fearless, wild, and rambling rebel, which kind of appealed to me. And so, no longer a boy, yet not yet a man, I stepped across what I thought was the threshold of manhood out onto that Broad Highway not even saying goodbye to my loved ones. I just up and left. Beguiled by a deceiver, I left the Lovely Land of the Deep Fetch behind. Why I spent more than the next two decades unwittingly working my way toward the Gates of Hell as that lovely Land of the Deep Fetch gradually disappeared into the past. At the age of 38, I had reached the Gates of Hell and had already passed through those great iron doors down into the drunk and drug-infested hopelessness of that place when out of the paling memories of the Land of the Deep Fetch I felt a Loving Hand of uncontested strength gently lift me up out of the bowels of that iron doored dungeon! My LORD, MY LORD!!!  What I had Fetched after in the days of my youth had Fetched me. Oh, what kind of Thing was this? (check out Philippians 3:12)

In the Spring of my years

When that Rose of Sharon bloomed,

And shadows from the leaves of them big oak trees

Came dancing thru my room,

And tongues of fire from the light of the moon

Leapt like leopards down the hall,

Why, I wasn’t even Born Again

And I’d been captured by the Spirit of God.

 

Closer to Home, Closer to Home,

Back to where my loved ones

Lie beneath the stone.

Closer to Home, Closer to Home,

Back to where my heart lies

And it cuts me to the bone.

 

I went runnin’ wild, out on that Broad Highway.

I never said goodbye, it still grieves me to this day.

Closer to Home, Closer to Home.

 

In the summer of my years

A Black Rose began to bloom.

Out of Light so bright came the darkest of night

And the rumble of war and doom.

Jezebel, she was a tempest,

Oh, such a beautiful storm.

I did not know she was from down below,

I was snared by that black rose’s thorns.

 

Closer to Home

 

Then,

In the Fall a the Year,

A White Rose did appear.

Down the Sides of the North a cool breeze broke forth

And that storm began to clear.

Blessings fell like leaves outta them live oak trees

All around me outta the Blue,

When all I said was, yes, to an Unseen Guest

Back in the Fall of ’82.

 

Closer to Home

 

Now,

In the Winter of my years,

In the throes of an Ancient Wind,

Stands a Timeless Rose that rose again

To save the souls of men.

Now the life of a man, a mere man might save

He might even give his own,

But souls live on to Die Again,

Are you covered by the Blood Red Rose?

¶ What I had Fetched after in the days of my youth had Fetched me. I found myself not only back in the lovely Land of the Deep Fetch, but astute, keen, and fully alive on the other side of the Hidden Entrance of that Clandestine Hideout in a land I now know as the Covenant Land of the Deep Fetch. The very same Lord, whose Presence I was unknowingly Fetching After as a boy in the fields, and forest, in the glens and dales, and ultimately, down into that meadow laced with brooks, had reached down with uncontested Power and ever so gently, Fetched me out!  Why He had not forgotten me nor my great desire as a boy to use the “Gifts” HE had personally given me to explore the Secret Place of the Deep Fetch where the intriguing things of the Lord are just waiting to be unveiled. For the Lord Himself has since said to me, “Seek and you will find, knock and the door into the Deep Fetch will open, ask, and what’s in there, will be given to you. Don’t go fixing your gaze on the things of this world, (they are but a Magic Lantern Show) – learn to set your gaze deep into the Eyes of the Lord, on the things which are not seen, for the things that your eyes do so cherish on this earth will vanish like smoke, they’re temporal, but the things which are not seen, they’re eternal. BELIEVING!!! That is the KEY that will OPEN the eyes of your heart and give you the ability to see in the Spirit that the world and all of its ages were framed by the Word of God. You see, the things of and in this world which are seen were made by Me” said the Lord, “out of what you cannot see. Without Me, nothing was made. The miraculous wonders of the heavens and the earth, in all their beauty, because of the corruption of man, will vanish like smoke. They will burn with a fervent heat. So consider carefully what it is you spend your whole life Fetching After, for this is, indeed, a Deep Fetch! (2 Corinthians 4:18, Matthew 7:7, Hebrews 11:3)

 

Faith is the gaze of the soul

Deep into the eyes of the Lord.

Ain’t it so!

 

Faith is the stuff of things hoped for,

The evidence of things not seen.

By Faith we know this world was framed

Out of what we cannot see.

Ain’t it so!

 

Visions, oh they are but flakes of snow

Upon some distant star,

And Faith, it is the lookin’ glass

That sees them from afar.

Ain’t it so!

 

My Faith, it will not stagger.

Like Abraham, I see

God’s promises, like flakes of snow

Falling just for me.

Ain’t it so!

 

Now the Lord God said,

And it was so,

As soon as the ‘Said’ was sown

The Ages began to roll

Now ain’t that so!

 

As for this Faith,

What shall I say?

I Fetched it from the Deep!

Now come what may

My soul shall say,

“Oh death, where is your sting?”

Ain’t it so

Ain’t it so

Ain’t it so

 

¶ What I had Fetched after in the days of my youth had Fetched me! (Philippians 3:12)  How astonishing is that? Yes, I awoke, as if out of a comatose stupor, at 38 years of age, and found myself in Covenant with the Creator of the heavens and the earth, at Home in the Covenant Land of the Deep Fetch – Fetching, thru His Covenant Promises, the deep things of the Lord out HIS fathomless Treasury. Had I finally Fetched that Friend that stuck closer than a brother – or did He Fetch me?

¶ Considering all this, I must say, though the Lord wants to reveal so much to us, the workings of the Holy Spirit thru the warp and the woof of fallen mankind are a Mystery so great that no one – on this side of heaven – will ever fully understand, this side of heaven. Now, Ain’t That So!

¶ I didn’t know it at the time, but back in those blissful days of my boyhood, it was almost as though I had unknowingly been under the Old Covenant of the Law for a season just to show me that, as hard as I did seek and as much as my heart did desire, and even though I was gifted by Him with seeing what many could not, and as close as I came at times I still could not, by my own volition, “enter in” to that “other realm”. That “Power” just was not there. And so, frustrated by unbelief, and dogged by discouragement, I took to that Broad Highway of Sin until I came to my own bending end – and when I did – He was there, waiting to bring me back again, not just back into the Land of the Deep Fetch, but all the way thru that seemingly impenetrable veil of shadows into the glorious Light of the Covenant Land of the Deep Fetch simply because He Loved me. This relentless, compassionate, gentle, Great-Heart, never violated my own free will and still, by the unfathomable workings of His Spirit, He brought me Home! He simply let me get to the place where deception had taken its toll and there was nowhere left to look, but UP. Because of His great triumph and my great failure, I gave it ALL to HIM, which He, immediately, and benevolently took and turned around for my good. He washed me in the only Thing that would wash away my sin, His Own Blood. The Blood that He Himself shed on that Cross, 2000 years ago. The Cleansing Blood of the Lamb Slain. Then He gave me a New Heart, Restored my body, and said  “Son, Come In.” And me? Well, finally, I “Entered In” through that hidden entrance that I had, as a boy, so diligently searched for in the Forest of the Deep Fetch.  The Golden Gates of that Hidden Entry is the Cross of Jesus Christ. The very One Who Created all of these things that so enamored me. You see, once you say YES to Jesus Christ, those Golden Gates simply appear. Quite incredible; It was there all the time. Jesus Christ IS that Hidden Entrance. Yes, in the twinkling of an eye, I found myself in the Secret Place of the Most High, where I heard the most kind, and benevolent Voice say, “Welcome Home!” (Romans 8:28, Hebrews 2:11 my emphasis)

¶ Taking all of this into account, here I am, 41 years later at the age of 79, in the Covenant Land of the Deep Fetch, still roaming the fields and the forests of the Deep Fetch, thru the glens, dales, dells, and the meadows of the Wheat and the Tares – looking for someone to share these wonderful Mysteries of God with, that I might Fetch them into this exciting Covenant Land of the Deep Fetch, that I might show them the Hidden Entrance into that Secret Place. Why that wouldn’t be you, would it?

CLOSER TO HOME ©Will Callery

 

This is Will Callery, and this is LETTERS FROM OVER YONDER. You have been listening to “The Land of the Deep Fetch, {part I}”, a Letter From Over Yonder.

To paint upon the minds of others the desired hues and shades that do so richly adorn the Word of God, one must own a Literary Loom given to them by the Spirit in order to weave the warp and the woof of such a thing into the hearts, and minds of others. Wrapping our minds with revelatory understanding is expedient, for it opens the gate to that sometimes well-worn, and at other times, seldom traveled path to the heart, allowing the keeper of that mind and heart, the reader, to journey into the Land of the Deep Fetch, where, with God, all things are possible, even seeing into the unseen, where the Spirit that holds the reader captive dwells.

God bless you each and everyone with a true revelation of Who He is, Jesus Christ, our Kinsman Redeemer!

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