The Problem With Gnats

A few weeks ago, we had a visit from a family we didn't invite. It was a family of gnats. They seemed to enjoy our pantry, and before long, there were sons, daughters, grandsons, granddaughters and great, great, great grandsons and granddaughters. By the time it was all over, there were cousins and second cousins. It just so happened, my husband had to go out of town on a work trip last Monday morning. Just before Ben left, we took everything out of the pantry and sprayed some powerful gnat killer spray. So, the gnat families and I were left to battle who won control of the pantry. To date, we are at a stand off.

 

I've gotten a bit overwhelmed at the chaos. Pantry food stacked everywhere. Gnat killer smells that seemed to radiate throughout the house and my head. The gnats decided they wanted a week's vacation at our address, so another gnat bomb was sent their way today. I'm hoping to lay the gnat family to rest this week.

 

Just when I thought I had control of these pesky things, I'd open the pantry door. More gnats. CRAZY! The problem with gnats is that they keep bubbling up when you least suspect it. I wanted them to just go away. Forever. I got really "fumed" every time I thought they were gone, but weren't.

 

I knew there would be a gnat lesson somewhere, somehow, out of this whole ordeal. There are certain things in my own personal life that keep bubbling up when I least suspect it. Usually they are classified as behaviors, attitudes and reactions to things that have grown to become habits.  Impatience when I'm in a hurry. Inner critic talking up a storm in my mind. Ways of handling things that are negative patterns. Yet, it is easier to close the door of my heart, act like I'm OK, and just ignore these issues in my own soul. 

 

So, I'm learning to do a better job of dealing with my stuff. Yes, dealing with it. Calling it what it is. We have to deal with our problems head-on. Don't try to go around them. It's better to hit our challenges head on before they hit us. Peter Scazzero in this book "Emotionally Healthy Spirituality" writes "God made us as whole people, in his image (see Genesis 1:27). That image includes physical, social emotional, intellectual, and social dimensions. Ignoring any aspect of who we are as men and women made in God's image always results in destructive consequences- in our relationship with God, with others, and with ourselves."

 

When I failed to pay attention to God and what was going on inside me, it was like those pesky gnats in my closet.  Things kept coming back to haunt me. I have learned that some of the walls I've hit in my journey with God were probably some of His greatest gifts to me. These walls stopped me in my tracks, changed me and broadened my understanding of myself and God's desires for my life. How about you? What problem are you trying to suppress that just doesn't go away? 

 

Join me in prayer:  "Dear Lord, slow me down this day that I might pay better attention to you in my life. You are God and I am not. You know the inside workings of my soul and all the things I try to stuff away and hide. I can't hide from you. May I trust in you as my refuge knowing that you are a secure place to hide. Give me courage to face those things in my life I try to stuff away. My pride often wants to hide these things, particularly because of my position, but Lord, teach me the joys of humility. Unleash a revival in my soul that will give me the ability to admit my stuff and seek healing. In Jesus' name. Amen."

 

Nancy Abbott is the Chaplain for the YMCA of Greater San Antonio.