"Eat honey, my son, for it is good; honey from the comb is sweet to your taste. Know also that wisdom is like honey for you: If you find it, there is a future hope for you, and your hope will not be cut off". Proverbs 24:13-14 NIV

My wife and I love honeybees and butterflies and despite 10 consecutive years of diminishing returns, we continue to plant all of their favorite flowers. We normally only see one or two of these pollinators a day at summer's peak, but we will keep planting as long as they keep coming.

Like the former and the latter rains of the Old Testament, our slim pickens of a honeybee summer was followed with a great surprise: wild bees came to see us for about three weeks until the first frost came.

We asked our local beekeeper (we buy his super sweet red clover honey often) and William identified the bees as being wild, judging by their behavior and timing.

Our unrelenting drought of 2024 had evidently finally dried up their available forest forage, and they were coming to us for nector, especially from our South American Sages. Just like the latter rain of the OT, these last bees of summer were a welcome and truly appreciated occurrence.

I got to thinking about how hardworking and very highly individual these bees were and briefly thought of the first Followers of the Way and of how the pure Gospel they received markedly set them apart from the general population in the Jerusalem, just as these bees lived separately from their domesticated brethren who lived in artificial man made hives.

These wild bees had never know a keeper nor a socialized colony, just as the first believers no longer had no desire to willingly continue to be a part of the dark world and ways of man, once they had heard and understood the Gospel presented to them.

Just as unlikely as it would have been for these Followers of the Way to assimilate back into the evil and dangerous world about them, it is equally unlikely that wild bees would ever join a domesticated hive of honeybees.

After reading that bees are used in the Bible as symbols of God's love, blessings, wisdom, and strength, we felt honored that these "last bees of summer" came to stay with us, and we thank our Father for their visit. *

*When bees are dying, they will either fall or fly to the ground and their front legs will begin to fail them, causing them to pitch forward and bow down to the ground, as if in prayer.

Rik Charbonneaux is a retired NE Iowan who loves all of God's Word and all of His creatures.