Three months ago I moved into a new apartment. This is a nicer apartment than I
was living in, even though the rent is less. This apartment is less expensive to
heat and cool because the walls are thicker and there is more insulation. There
is less room, because it is a one bedroom and the last one was a two bedroom. I
did not need the extra space and in this new apartment, with the limited
furniture that I have, this apartment actually looks like someone lives here. I
have much greater peace living here. It seems like God is nearer. Everything is
great in this apartment, well almost everything.
One morning as I was leaving to travel to some of the jails that I am allowed to
serve in, I noticed some small black insects crawling on my new kitchen counter.
I looked closely and noticed that they were tiny black ants. There were only a
few, so I swatted them and left for the day.
That evening when I got home the kitchen counter was almost black and moving
greatly! I became concerned. I went next door and asked the renters that live
there if they were having an ant problem. They assured me that they did not, but
that a couple of days ago they had. They bought some ant spray and sprayed down
their whole kitchen area and all the ants had died or left, that no, they were
not having an ant problem and would I like to borrow their ant spray? (Honestly,
I would rather have the ants than the poison spray in my kitchen area)
I returned to my kitchen and killed all the ants I could find, thinking that I
had gotten rid of them. Twenty minutes later I got up to get me a snack and my
kitchen counter was moving black again. What should I do? I went outside and
looked around the foundation of this apartment. Really close to my next door
neighbours door was a line of ants coming up the concrete block foundation. The
ants were going up under the siding of the apartment and some how coming in
through a tiny crack at the top of my kitchen window, going all around the 16
feet of my upper cabinets, then coming down to the end of them and returning 12
feet across the counter top to my kitchen sink area. There must have been
thousands of them.
The more I killed, the more that showed up. It was now a weekend and my 13 year
old son, Billy was visiting me. He was in for a royal three day weekend of
fighting ants and enjoying every minute of it. Armed with a quart spray bottle
and whatever he could think of to mix up in it. (Laundry soap, bleach, gasoline,
and finally dish soap) This child taught me something that few adults know yet
today. (if they did, many of the chemical companies would be out of business
today) Two tablespoons of dish soap in a quart of water will kill black ants on
contact.
There is however a problem in this ant killer, after it dries it has no effect
on the next ant that crawls across where it has been sprayed. In those three
days Billy and I must have found 20 different ant families that were living in
the ground around these two apartment buildings. Each family that had lived here
had a ant problem, and were fighting them by spraying on the inside of their
apartments. Billy used most of a new bottle of "Joy" dish washing detergent in
those three days, possibly killing over one million ants that weekend.
The number that was coming into my kitchen and now my bathroom was far less than
in the beginning. We were winning the battle, I thought. A few days later I
returned from being gone two days and my ant problem was greater than ever
before. The outside weather was getting warmer and the ants were getting
thicker. I bought a couple bottles of far less expensive dish soap and it killed
them as well, but my ant problem grew greater.
I honestly can not even estimate how many hours I spent walking around the
outside of this apartment building spraying different runs of ants. I had to do
something! I went to my landlord and told him about the problem. He told me that
his brother ran a hardware store across the street, to go see him and he would
furnish me with some stuff to get rid of the ants. Wow! I was excited. Finally I
would get rid of all these ants!
I went to the hardware store and the brother listened to my story, nodded his
head and handed me a small $2.00 bottle of clear liquid and told me to pour out
a teaspoon full at each ant run and to leave them alone. I looked at him kind of
funny and thought, "sure". Oh well, I had tried everything I knew. I had spent
many hours fighting this battle and the war had just gotten greater.
Inside this small bottle was a really sticky liquid, (it got on my hands as I
was pouring it out). I poured some at several ant runs, and walked about the
different runs to see how it ants would react to it. At first the ants moved
away from it. After about 10 minutes, I noticed only one ant coming close to it.
It would get close, then go away from it. In a few minutes one ant did make
contact with it. It seemed to send out a signal, soon there were several ants
eating this stuff. Soon there were ants all around the puddle I had poured
fighting to get their fair share. Soon there was a stream of ants coming and
eating and leaving for home from this puddle. I had read the instructions on the
bottle, telling where there was a poison in this sweet syrup that attracted the
ants. They would eat it and get it on their bodies and would take it back to
their home and kill every ant that lived with them.
It was almost dark now. I looked at each ant trail one more time thinking that
this is not going to work and went inside for the night. The next morning when I
woke and went into the kitchen to turn the coffee on, I noticed something
different, my counter top was no longer moving. I went outside and looked at all
the ant runs I had treated. There were none. They were gone.
This reminded me of the many times we labour and do everything in our power
trying to do something and finally call out to God, and He through His Holy
Spirit, while we sleep, fixes our problems. This lasted only a few days and
other ant families moved in using the same runs up into the apartment building
again. I went to the hardware store again and the man handed me more poison
sweet syrup.
This time as I poured out this sweet deadly syrup, I watched as God showed me
how sin destroys the lives of many families, many cities and many countries.
This harmless looking sweet syrup, (sin) is poured out in puddles, at first
everyone stays away from it, fearful of the consequences. Then very slowly one
person will partake of this sinful nature and will proclaim, see it did not hurt
me, it will not hurt you either, come and enjoy! Come and taste for yourself, it
will make you wise and fat. One family member will take this poison of sin back
into their family, soon a whole community will be infected and dying in sin,
soon a whole city and like now our whole country is infested, living in sin,
calling that which God Says is sin, not to be sin.
People in this country change the name of what they are doing, so it will not
sound like sin. Family planning used to mean, making plans of how to support
your family, now it means abortion, (murder). Adultery used to be punishable by
death, now it is encouraged by the television networks and our government as
only normal. Men having sex with men and women having sex with women used to be
an abomination, to both God and mankind. Thou shall not lie with mankind, as
with womankind: it is abomination. (Leviticus 18:22) Now it is acceptable and
encouraged by much of our government and many of our schools.
People have stopped trusting God to supply all of their needs according to His
Riches in Glory. Men and women, fathers and mothers, are now taking jobs working
in places that are both a disgrace to themselves, their families and most of all
to God Almighty! He Who has promised to meet all their needs, if they will just
trust in Him. These parents are telling their children and even their
grandchildren that believing in and obeying God does not really matter anymore
by these actions. Children believe what they see far more than what we tell
them.
Trust in The Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own
understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He Shall Direct thy paths.
(Proverbs 3:5-6) Jesus Tells us, Come unto Me, all you that labour and are heavy
laden, and I will give you rest. Take My Yoke upon you and learn of Me; For I am
Meek and Lowly in heart: and you shall find rest unto your souls. For My Yoke is
easy, and My Burden is light. (Matthew 11:28-30) If we are not content in all
that God is doing in our lives today, if we think that we need to do something
to get more than God is providing for us, then we are calling God a liar. We
must all come to learn that, all things work together for good to them that Love
God and are called according to His Purpose. (Romans 8:28)
People, it is time for us to give our lives back to God. It is time for us to
give our trust back to God and let Him be God again. It is then that the
problems in our lives, our families, our cities and our countries will live in
peace and contentment, enjoying what God has provided for us and not desiring
what God Tell us, will destroy us.
Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter; Fear God and keep His
Commandments: for this is the whole duty of man. For God Shall Bring every work
into Judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good or whether it be
evil. (Ecclesiastes 12:13-14)
Author unknown. If anyone has a proprietary interest in this story please
authenticate and I will be happy to credit, or remove, as the circumstances
dictate.
Thanks to Bill Dorman
Chaplain777@hotmail.com
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