Swarm

The four fly strips were completely full.

Completely.

That is truly disgusting but amplified by the fact that we had hung them just twenty minutes earlier.

Some mysterious thing had caused an infestation of flies that filled the entire church building that Saturday. It was how I pictured Egypt at the time of the plagues and I was hoping that the frogs would be arriving soon to help us with these flies.

We'd tried swatting them. We'd tried spray. We'd tried fly strips. We'd tried everything they'd recommended at the corner store. We'd had prayer and binding and loosing and casting out. The flies still seemed to have the upper hand.

Having run out of ideas, we set off enough insecticide bombs to kill the house plants and went home for the night.

The next morning we quite literally swept the layer of flies off the floor of the church and wiped the insecticide off the chairs as we set up for the first service.

Things seemed to go reasonably well, but by the third service we were in trouble. A cloud of flies had assembled and taken over the back room. They were loud enough that we could hear them over the speaker. They were starting to spill out into the main room and were hovering a few feet over those seated for the sermon.

We cut to the closing song.

And on the last verse the flies had their final say as one flew into my mouth. Naturally, it got stuck on my soft palate so it would neither come out or go in. The song ended with me trapped in front of the congregation trying to scoop a still living fly out of the back of my mouth.

Yes, it was quite a Sunday.

Did I mention that it was Easter?

The invitations. The decorations. The new families. The guest ministers. The special crafts. The really great experiences we had (at least in the first 2 1/2 services). The willingness of people to endure swarms of flies.

I didn't mention those things either, did I?

It seems often the case that I spend most of my days battling swarms ---- physical, psychological, emotional, spiritual ---- that seem to take over. I pray at them, spray at them, or try to get them to stick to something (or someone) else. Sometimes when I take my eyes off them and try instead lift my voice in praise they choke me off.

And though I might want to just call it in early, it's Easter. I have a living Savior. And if I can close my mouth and look hard through the haze the swarm creates there are signs of resurrection happening amid the frantic buzz.

Because the swarms are real and so is the One who calls me through them. Getting too distracted by the flies leads to the despairing life of a losing battle of trying to swat them. Denying them as a means of focusing on the Christ eventually chokes the sharing the Good News with others.

The flies died off a few days later; we never found out why or how they got there. But because of Easter, He is still with us and will be, through swarms or clear skies, even unto the ends of the earth.

Lord, You are the Eternal One. Thank you.