After the Fire

I always enjoy catching up with my cousin Steve. Steve and I share more than common ancestors and memories of extended family gatherings. Even now, we can easily get launched into reminiscing about our years playing little league baseball or riding our motorbikes all over the county. But perhaps even more, we share a common experience of the land my parents worked so hard to build into a life and a legacy. When Mom and Dad retired from farming and moved to town, Steve and his wife Connie were thrilled to take over our family farm, a place they in turn called home for over 30 years.

So, the other day when Steve told me, “The wind and the fires have been really bad this year,” it caught my attention. Of course, early spring winds have swept across the Great Plains for thousands of years. But as the years have passed and the winter snows have become less dependable, this time of year—normally spent caring for cows and their newborn calves—has also become a time to nervously monitor the skies for windblown prairie fires.

When I was growing up, prairie fires were not common, but they were never far from our awareness. When the winds picked up and the grasses were thick and brittle, it didn’t take much—a lightning strike, a spark from a passing vehicle, or a careless match—to set the prairie ablaze.

Even now, a whiff of smoke from distant fires can remind me of those days, when winds would carry the smell for miles, a sharp, unsettling reminder of powerful forces moving across the land. Fences could be lost, pastures blackened, and in the worst cases, homes and livelihoods swept away in a matter of hours.

But we also understood something else. Fire, for all its danger, was not only destructive. The prairie had lived with fire for centuries. In time, we saw the blackened ground give way to green. New grass would emerge, often stronger and more resilient than before.

Lately, it seems those fires are becoming more frequent, more intense, harder to contain. Those who study these patterns suggest that a warming climate is an important part of that story. The patterns feel less predictable, and the land feels more vulnerable.

It’s hard not to wonder what my parents would make of it all. They didn’t talk much about climate, but they understood limits. They respected the soil, the weather, and the forces beyond their control.

Fire, like so much in creation, reminds us that we are not in charge.

As we move through Holy Week toward Easter, I find myself thinking about another kind of devastation. Good Friday must have felt like the end of everything the disciples had hoped for—a moment of loss and finality.

And then comes the waiting.

Before Easter morning, there is a day of silence and uncertainty—a day that feels like standing on a blackened prairie, unsure if anything will grow again.

But the story does not end there.

Easter is the quiet declaration that life can emerge where we least expect it. That what appears ruined is not beyond redemption. That God is at work even when the landscape of our lives—or our world—looks scorched and empty.

The prairie teaches a similar lesson, though never without cost. Renewal comes slowly, and it depends on how we care for what remains.

Perhaps that is part of the call of Easter for us—not only to celebrate new life, but to become better stewards of what has been entrusted to us. To act with humility and to trust in the possibility of renewal.

After the fire, the prairie can live again.

After the cross, the tomb is not the end.

Peace be with you, 

Jerry Kahrs