Opossum Comes a-Knockin'

*WARNING*-- Some of these pictures may give you the heebie-geebies. Because they do me…

Do you know what the most disgusting animal in the world is?

Meet—apparently—my resident opossum.

Oh yeah.

I was gone all week…and what do I come home to?

This nasty scavenger.

Barf.

Gag.
I think I just threw up in my mouth.

From the ghastly nose to the sordid tip of it’s filthy, nauseating tail, my contempt for the creature knows no bounds.

They say God created all animals. I almost disagree about these (and other such rodents). I believe these are a horrid mutation which is product to the fall.
Surely a good God couldn’t have created THIS.
Ha.

Do you know what the worst part is?

He seems to want to call my acreage “HOME.”

I don’t know about you, but something seems wrong with that to me. Yeah. I don’t appreciate creatures who exist off garbage finding my residence a place they are comfortable with.

Then of course my mind has to ask itself the question: What if it is not a HE?

What if it’s a SHE and what if that SHE is planning on being a MAMA???
At my house….??????????

Then what?

Clearly, I called my father about the situation.

“GO SHOOT IT!!!!” I yelled, frantic.
And in typical Devil’s Advocate, or should I say Opossum Advocate, well….now that I type that I realize it’s the same thing…In typical Devil Opossum Advocate fashion he responds to me with “What did it ever do to you?”

It existed.

Do I really need to elaborate the problem more?

And it existed at my house.

 I’m offended.

And I don’t know how my brain does this, but, needless to say, as I stood out there in my yard watching it, all I could think was how closely it does, in fact, parallel the devil.

I’ve mentioned in previous posts that when you live in the country you do not put food scraps—garbage, as we call it—in the trash. No, we put it out in the field or the compost.

Well, it just so happens, that’s what this thing was eating.

All of my garbage.
It EXISTS because I have supplied it with garbage.

Now how true is that of the devil? Seriously!

Why does he feel so comfortable living at my house? Because I supply him ample amounts of garbage to survive on.

 Oh, Lord, have mercy on me.

 *Sigh*

If I wasn’t so disgusted I would laugh it off.

Not disgusted at the opossum. Not disgusted at the devil, no. Disgusted at me.

Because see, the problem is that me putting the garbage from inside my house to outside my house didn’t take care of the problem. It didn’t GET RID OF IT. It just moved it to where I don’t have to look at it as much.

And I do the exact same thing with the sin and “garbage” in my own life. Most of the time, honestly, I don’t get rid of it. I don’t take it to the cross, I don’t take it to the altar and BURN it (as God told his people for years and years and years to do), I don’t die to it. I just move it. I put it out of sight, so it’s out of mind. I don’t “go there” anymore.

Until…and this always happens…one day I find myself face to face with some kind of nasty creature, habit, devil, demon, emotion, hate, lust, fear, etc, still surviving. Still existing. Still living at my house and feeling Oh! So at home here.

Why?
Because I didn’t burn the scraps of flesh it survives on.

Why else did God tell the Israelites to, in essence, burn their sin? Why are we told to DIE to ourselves? Why are we crucified with Christ?

Because moving our garbage doesn’t get rid of it. Putting it out of our mind does just that—puts it out of our mind. It doesn’t get rid of it! It just welcomes scavenging flesh eaters to feast to the fill.
And goodness sakes, if I was one of those, if I was a “nasty creature, habit, devil, demon, emotion, hate, lust, fear, etc” that was being provided ample sustenance, why wouldn’t I stick around, terrorizing the house owner and continuing to survive off the garbage she doesn’t get rid of?

I suppose it’s only natural.

Post-fall, natural.

Thank you, Jesus, you have come to give us an escape of the natural (II Cor 5:15-17).