Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Spreading Bedbugs

Over my time in South Asia, bedbugs have been an off and on problem.  I think I've been in contact with them 6 different times (that I am aware of).  By G0d's grace, I haven't ever carried of them back to the flat with me and put them in my own bed.  I really think that is a miracle!

The latest bedbug escape happened in a place I did not expect.  Not a home, not a hotel, not even a bed.
A taxi!
We were riding down the road when Julie told me to look at something on the back of the headrest.  I looked and was filled dread.  It had the shape of a bedbug.  I thought, "Surely not.  I'm in a taxi."
Just as soon as I had thought it, Julie spotted another one on the back of the other headrest.
Confirmed.  This taxi had at least a small infestation of bedbugs.
It didn't take us long to decide that we needed to get out of the taxi and find a new one.  We were remembering the nightmarish and itchier-than-anything-ever-in-your-life bites from previous bedbug experiences.
We got out of the taxi and shook ourselves out and looked each other over.
The truck drivers on the side of the road got their entertainment for the day.
Then we hailed another taxi, one with leather seats--not upholstery , and continued on our way.

I thought at the time there must be some analogy or greater meaning behind all these bedbug experiences we've had.

A few hours later, it came to me.

Bedbugs spread.  Fast.
Take, for instance, a person has bed bugs at their home.  She stays at a hotel.  Prior to her leaving her home, a bedbug or two crawls into her bag.  When she opens the bag at the hotel, the bedbugs start getting into everything in the hotel room.
Another person comes and stays in the hotel room.  They accidentally take a few bedbugs from the hotel with them and load a plane.  Now the bedbugs are in another city.  The person unpacks in her home and further spreads the bedbugs.  Then the person gets in a taxi.  A couple of bedbugs had clung to her clothes and she deposits them in the taxi.
Everywhere people go, they bring the bedbugs with them, and they spread.
The spreading bedbugs become out of control in no time.
It is extremely hard to get rid of bedbugs once you have them...like impossible to do.

Shouldn't the Good News be like bedbugs?
Shouldn't one person have it, come into contact with a person without it, and give it to them?
Then shouldn't that person go to where ever they are going, perhaps a different city, share it with them and spread it?
Shouldn't everywhere JC followers go, they bring the Good News with them, and it spreads?
Shouldn't the spreading Good News become out of control in no time?
And once people have it, shouldn't the Good News be so life-transforming that once they have it, they won't want to get rid of it and since it is from G0d it would be impossible to do anyway?

May we as Jesus Followers spread the Good News like bedbugs!!

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