Crickets! Why does it have to be crickets?!!

4:42 p.m. Today's project was to find out whether we still need an opening to the crawl space above a closet in one of the upstairs bedrooms. Steve had originally gone into the space under the roof to add insulation shortly after we moved here in 1988, and later, he would remove the cover to pull out dead rats and then reset the traps. We'd kind of wait until we'd hear shuffling movements above our bedrooms, and then wonder what the horrible smell was above my daughters' beds. Dead rat, disgusting!

A number of years ago, we hired Dewey Pest control to regularly come out, bait and empty traps, as well as work on keeping rats from eating produce in my garden, or the grapefruit on our trees. The current bait trap has been so efffective, and the "treat" so yummy to the nasty disease-carrying creatures, that we haven't had a rat in the house for over a year. Thank You, Lord! I'm sure rats serve a purpose in creation, but we've decided that we don't care to have them share the house with us! God gives us decisionmaking power over the property He entrusts us with. We can be wise and prudent with our property, share it appropriately with others in need, or lie about our "good deeds" and intentions, like Ananias and Sapphira did in Acts 5: 1-11, which cost them their lives. They kept back a portion of the proceeds of a land sale, but claimed that the amount they donated what all that they received. Lying about the transaction was the sin that led to their deaths. Peter reinforced the principle of property ownership when he said in verse 3-4,

Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and keep back part of the price of the land for yourself? While it remained, was it not your own?And after it was sold, was it not in your control? Why have you conceived this thing in your heart? You have not lied to men but to God.

Rats are now under control, Jada gets her flea collar changed regularly, we have a termite service, and no bits of food are left for cockroaches, so I haven't seen any, and we don't seem to have the ant invasions we suffered with when the house was new 24 years ago. But since we know that in this world, as my mother would say, "there's no rest for the weary," now I have one, two, or three crickets sneaking in here each evening. I have about an hour late every evening where I let Jada in, give her a treat, and then we relax in the family room to watch a couple of innocuous--but not doctrinally correct--tear-jerking episodes of "Touched by an Angel" that I record. I keep the tv on the Gospel Music Channel, which is devoted to Christian and family programming, and get a chance to watch programs we were too busy with the family every evening to enjoy decades ago. It's wonderful to watch television with no profanity or lewdness, especially the Christian music videos in various genres. Then with bedtime comes my evening devotional, a chapter of a Christian novel and one of a challenging book on growing in one's walk with the Lord, leadership and/or ministry, and  I have a restful sleep despite the loss of Steve.

God is so good!

Of course, there's got to be a "fly in the ointment" (Ecclesiastes 10:1). For the last month, every night I have seen a cricket walking on my kitchen floor or making its way across the family room carpet. I even saw a big one on my staircase wall! "HOW DARE THEY!" I mutter, and go for the broom and dustpan I now keep handy, smash it, and dump it into the downstairs toilet. I flush away one, two or three of the hideous creatures each night, including any spare legs that might have come loose. Ugh.

I know that they been hiding away in the garage in boxes of books, papers and folders that have been disrupted by the general cleanup my son-in-law has been doing for me with since November. They must be coming in when Jada and I go in and out of the garage, or, there is the dreadful prospect that they are already here in the house. Seeing a huge lizard, or even a snake, like we would at my dad's house in the Redlands orange groves or here across the road from us in the wilderness park doesn't unnerve me. But a trail of ants can make me vomit, and spiders are ugly despite the cleanup work they do on tiny bugs, but these crickets are truly getting on my nerves.

When we see problems in our Christian lives that are hard to resolve, even if they are not overly serious, it should cause us to take stock of our walk with Jesus and see if we are taking all possible means to focus on Him. Are we digging deeply into His word, asking the Holy Spirit to assist our efforts to understand it; are we listening to outstanding Bible teachers and pastors for increased learning and clarification; are we daily spending time alone with Him in prayer and worship? Are we, as the Lord leads, memorizing verses, passages, chapters or even books of the Bible? If not, why not? Psalm 119:11 says,

Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee.

Confess sins speedily, make things right with those around us, and let God show you what to do to resolve life's issues and irritations. God's solutions and plans of action for us, given by the voice of the Holy Spirit, are as many and varied as the stars in the sky. And He has answers for you!

As for those crickets?  I'll be starting a bug service right away!