It was a breakout!
We found the signs that the chicken pen had been broken into. The door had the wire at the bottom corner pulled away forming a perfect hole for a chicken to escape the roomy, safe pen.
How? What?
No chicken was found dead or mangled, thank goodness.
Then we realized what must have happened.
We have a beautiful, lavender rooster, Eugene, who has been difficult to keep in a pen. Even with clipped wings, he manages to escape the pens we have to roam and explore in freedom.
He fell in love with a blonde hen named Helga, or at least they became a couple or a pair, staying together. Eugene is very protective of Helga, but we wanted the eggs Helga produced without hunting everywhere for them. So we kept Helga in the pen.
Eugene visited Helga through the fence and mock fought the red rooster who lived in the pen with the other hens. They were ferocious, but separated so they couldn’t hurt each other.
Now the pair of chickens were free to roam and sneak eat the cat and dog food when they found it, to crow loudly at Andrew and Laura’s window in the morning, to try to get on the decks and porches to see if there was anything to eat there, and, generally, explore the land.
At night, they fly up to perch on the roof of the pen where the other hens and Helga had lived. Side by side, close together they go to sleep.
However, it seems Eugene has added to his harem. He now has another hen with him, and she is blonder than Helga!
We don’t expect Eugene to be faithful to one hen, since that’s not the way roosters and hens group themselves.
But the Bible tells us what happens when men are attracted to more than one woman and have relationships with several women at a time. Samson, the mighty warrior, was weak when it came to women and a wife and relationships with two women. Delilah, one of the women, betrayed him.
King Solomon, although gifted with great wisdom from God, married 700 wives and had 300 concubines. Many of these marriages were political, and the women worshipped foreign gods they brought with them. Even Solomon built altars to the false gods.
No one is sinless except Jesus Christ, God and the Holy Spirit.
God intended marriage to be between one man and one woman and they would be unified in all ways: “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife; and they shall be one flesh.”
In our fall from Eden, we have strayed far from God’s view and plan for marriage. But with repentance, we can find forgiveness through Christ’s sacrifice on the cross. We can ask His Guidance in what to do next to heal and transform marriage.
We aren’t a bunch of roosters and hens.
