We waxed philosophical today. At least that’s what I think I’ll call it. As we sat in our unique, open-air dining facility (lawn chairs at the back of the open hatchback of our minivan, which also, by the way served as our staging station. It was packed to the gills with extra gloves, hand sanitizer, empty boxes, bottles of water, salvage “hopefuls,” tennis shoes and sandals, juice boxes, rags, Clorox bottles, cleaning supplies, cell phones, my new briefcase from Stan – he didn’t like the Christmas gift bag I was using, so he gave me one he wasn’t using – a box of snacks from one of the relief organizations, towels), eating yet another free hot meal provided by Christ in Action (Great news today, by the way. They will be here for a few more weeks, so lunch will be great!), we realized just how many flies we had “met” over the last days. There didn’t seem to be as many today. We decided that must have been for two reasons. One, the bulldozers and bobcats and The Claw had been here and actually pretty well cleaned up the street. That means the contents of five or six refrigerators and freezers that had been gracing our nostrils with that certain pungent aroma as well as providing the flies with breakfast, lunch, supper and prime maggot-growing opportunities were gone. Absent. The intensity of odor was well, not gone, but definitely not as overpowering. And the sheer number of flies had without question decreased.
The second reason for the population reduction had to be the fly trap Kel had brought over several days before after claiming the flies were targeting him in particular to chew on. The fly trap was quite simple in design. It was a plastic jar about the size of a Miracle Whip salad dressing bottle. It had some kind of sugar water inside (the mysterious “bait”), and a top that extended out from the top of the jar like the top hat on one of those old pictures of Abraham Lincoln. That was connected to two twistie ties that Kel used to hook it onto the tree in front of the house. The idea was that the fly would be attracted by the bait, enter the trap through the top hat, and be trapped within. Ingenious, and right in view of our outdoor dining room – a pleasant sight, I might add.
Anyway, as we ate our chicken something or other with rice and okra, we noticed the trap. It was literally teeming with flies! The waiting list to enter was constantly a madhouse with pushing and shoving and jockeying for position. Hundreds who had made it inside were buzzing around the tiny area, smashing into the walls and each other. Dozens more had expended all their energy, and had fallen to their death into the sweetness that was the liquid bait. As bad as those of us who had given Kel a hard time when we brought the trap into our midst hated to admit it, the silly thing worked.
That’s when we “got to thinking.” As I recall, it was Chris who had the first thought. Something along the lines of, “You know, there’s a real spiritual message in that fly trap. I bet you could work it into a sermon sometime.” That’s all I needed for sure, and everybody seemed to get into the act. Ideas were flying back and forth like – well, like the flies in the trap!
See, the trap is just like sin. It is sweet-smelling, sounds like fun, attractive. Then it becomes an obsession, something that you are willing to get at all costs, pushing and shoving to get your place in line, your “rightful piece of the action,” what you deserve anyway. And then you are there. Right in the middle of the sin, and you don’t even know it. All you know is that you have to keep going, keep flying, keep fighting for the “sweetness.” And occasionally you look out, because the wall was clear, you know. You look out and see what appears to a beautiful world. It’s kind of cloudy now, though, from all that bumping and smearing and breathing hard and exertion. Maybe you even think about trying to get out of the jar, break the habit, clean up your act. Maybe you work your way all the way to the top of the jar. But what do you find there? More flies trying to get in. Every exit has been turned into an entrance (like the causeway during an evacuation). You struggle for awhile, but before long it’s just too much trouble. Besides, how could all these other flies be wrong? Everybody is trying to get in here, so it must be OK. Then, gradually perhaps, you don’t notice the outside any more. You give up the struggle and return to your continuous circle of flight, around and around and around, until you begin to think that where you are is all there is. There is no “outside the jar.” That’s just an old wives’ tale, made up by the religious establishment to ensure their place in the jar. All there is. All there is. All there is. Until one day your strength gives out and you can fly no more. You find yourself falling, slipping into the “sweetness” that is actually the terrible end result of your sin, spiritual death. Eternal separation from God. Is there no way out of the jar? Well, I suppose there is a way. The guy who set the jar up could come over and pull off the top. But why would he do that? You chose to enter and ultimately you chose to stay. Besides, he doesn’t want you stinking up his clean outside world with your maggots. And on top of that, the other flies in there don’t want out anyway. I suppose he could take another approach. He could become a fly himself, enter through the to hat, find the one or two flies who are struggling to get out, and show them the way through the maze that traps them. But if he does that, those flies who are content to stay won’t like it. And those who are waiting to get in will crush down on him. He will be pushed back, forced into the deadly sweetness. Death. But maybe, just maybe, he is a special kind of fly. One like no other who has ever been into the trap before. He was, after all, the one who hung it in the first place. Maybe he overcomes the sweetness. Maybe he explodes from the muck at the bottom of the jar and soars in a straight line, right to the top hat, right to the way out of this mess. Maybe he forges a permanent hole in the top hat just big enough for one fly at a time to follow him, but only if they keep their hundred eyes all trained on him, all watching his way.
OK. I know we didn’t get that involved in the discussion. I took some poetic license and created the parable, but the inspiration was there. Inspiration of the flies. How’s that for a title?
“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 6:23)
Father, it is disgusting to think of myself as a fly. Forgive me for my “fly-dom.” Free me from it. Please. Amen
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