Eating Worms
It’s a given that moms have eyes in the back of their head. Do they have ears in front? On top? What we overhear is critical to our children’s safety sometimes, though it may threaten a mom’s adrenalin overload.
My middle son was five when his four-year-old girl cousin visited on a this-is-why-we-live-in-Wisconsin summer afternoon. They played in the yard within eyesight and earshot while I weeded the garden. This is the conversation I overheard.
Son: So, you like worms?
Cousin: I don’t know. I never tried one.
I dropped the hoe and ran to snatch the nightcrawler just as it reached the lips of the taste-tester. I’m pretty sure—not positive—that my son meant, “Do you like to LOOK at worms? Do you like to watch them crawl around and climb sticks?”
We can’t imagine anyone older than four volunteering to taste-test a nightcrawler. But neither can we imagine a child accepting an illegal drug with the response, “I don’t know. I never tried it.” It happens. Out of the reach of a parent’s grab-and-snatch.
What does God overhear? An affair? I don’t know. I never tried it. An ad for an X-rated website? I don’t know. I never tried it. Poisoning a coworker’s chances so I can keep my job? I don’t know. Never tried it.
Sometimes humanity needs the reminder that if the answer is, “I don’t know. I never tried it”, the reason may be because it’s disgusting, dangerous, destructive, and/or disobedient to God’s laws.
We serve a God with ears. He hears it all. And He won’t chuckle when we try to “eat worms.”
PRAYER: Lord of All, help me live a life so true to Your Word and so tightly in keeping with Your ways that I’ll not be troubled to know You’re overhearing it all.
“Give ear to my words, O Lord, consider my meditation. Hearken unto the voice of my cry, my King, and my God; for unto thee will I pray. My voice shalt thou hear in the morning, O Lord; in the morning will I direct my prayer unto thee, and will look up,” Psalm 5:1-3 KJV.
Today’s devotional is by Cynthia Ruchti, writer and producer of the radio ministry THE HEARTBEAT OF THE HOME and current president of American Christian Fiction Writers. Cynthia’s debut novel—They Almost Always Come Home—releases from Abingdon Press in Spring 2010. Cynthia writes stories of hope that glows in the dark. www.cynthiaruchti.com
