Aesop’s Fables Month: The Lion and the Mouse
Being small, I’ve often been encouraged by idioms such as “Dynamite comes in small packages,” or “Big things come in little packages.” I may even have heard these as reminders after reading about the tiny but mighty mouse in tonight’s Aesop’s Fable. And to encourage you, dear reader, I’ve included some great events in history where individually small components came together to create huge victories.
See, we are conditioned to look upward when seeking rescue. We scan the horizon for anything massive and strong to deliver us. Deep pockets, big shoulders, or grand miracles. Yet time and again, the ancient wisdom of Aesop reminds us that the cords binding the mighty are rarely severed by giants; they are cut strand by strand by those the world deems too small to count.
The Classic Fable Retold
Dozing in the warmth of the afternoon sun, a great lion was startled awake when a tiny field mouse scurried across his nose. Annoyed, the king of the forest pinned the creature beneath a heavy paw, baring his teeth. The trembling mouse pleaded for mercy, crying, “Spare my life, great King, and one day I may repay the favor.” Amused by the sheer absurdity that a helpless rodent could ever aid the ruler of the wild, the lion laughed and let him go.
Days later, the lion found himself cornered. Snared in a heavy rope net that was set by hunters, his struggle and mighty roars only tightened the cords. Thrashing in vain against the coarse hemp, his pride and power collapsed into helpless exhaustion. Hearing those familiar, desperate bellows echoing through the brush, the tiny mouse returned. Setting his sharp teeth against the thickest knot, the little creature began to gnaw. Fiber by fiber, strand by strand, the mouse chewed until the mesh frayed, snapped, and set the mighty predator free.
Dunkirk: When Battleships Needed Dinghies
History proved Aesop’s point along the cold surf of France in the early summer of 1940. Over three hundred thousand elite Allied soldiers—the armored fist of an empire—were pinned against the beaches of Dunkirk. Behind them advanced the full fury of the German blitzkrieg; ahead of them lay the English Channel.
The mighty Royal Navy was paralyzed. Giant battleships and destroyers could not safely navigate the shallow, mine-choked waters, so it left them sitting ducks for aerial bombardment. The lion was cornered in a deadly net of geography and fire.
The rescue did not arrive in the form of a grand naval fleet. It came in a quiet, ragtag swarm of civilian wooden dinghies, weekend pleasure craft, paddle steamers, and shallow fishing boats. Manned by shopkeepers, elderly fishermen, and teenage boys, these little wooden “mice” crossed the smoking channel again and again. Reaching directly into the shallows where the war machines could not tread, they ferried hundreds of thousands to safety and altered the trajectory of the free world.
The March of Dimes: Deliverance in Pocket Change
A continent away, another towering giant was brought to its knees by an invisible predator. Polio was the scourge of summer, terrorizing communities and leaving thousands of children paralyzed in iron lungs. The full weight of modern medicine struggled in the dark, desperate for resources to unlock a viable vaccine.
The breakthrough was not bankrolled by a single corporate titan or a massive federal windfall. It was built by children. Across America, millions of ordinary families and school kids gave up their ice-cream money to mail single ten-cent coins directly to the White House. The mailrooms filled to overflowing, buried under mountains of tiny, silver offerings.
Those millions of individual, humble dimes funded Jonas Salk’s laboratory, broke the back of the epidemic, and eradicated the disease for generations to come. A nation’s crisis was resolved. And it wasn’t by a single strike of mighty power, but by the quiet power of the collective small.
Never Despise the Small Things
It is easy to look at the immense problems of our world, or even the heavy trials in our own lives, and feel hopelessly inadequate. We might convince ourselves that unless we possess immense wealth, high office, or grand influence, we have nothing valuable to bring to the fight.
Yet God rarely chooses the mighty to accomplish His deepest deliverances. He calls the willing. And, as the saying goes, “God doesn’t always call the equipped, but He always equips the called.” When circumstances leave the strong helpless and entangled, a quiet word of encouragement, a single small sacrifice, or steady, faithful labor can cut the very knot that held a giant bound.
Zechariah 4:10 BSB
[10] For who has despised the day of small things? But these seven eyes of the Lord, which scan the whole earth, will rejoice when they see the plumb line in the hand of Zerubbabel.”
1 Corinthians 1:26-27 BSB
[26] Brothers, consider the time of your calling: Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were powerful; not many were of noble birth. [27] But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.
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