Tip of My Iceberg

What happens when you get a stage full of bats, worms, snakes, and spiders? You get a corporate “Eww,” reflecting all things that make us squirm. Seven-year-old Cal and his fellow students put on a production that emphasized all things that cause our stomachs to twitch and our phobias to rise to the surface.

A play entitled “Squirm” isn’t something I’d have thought to produce, but something about playing the parts of slithering, slimy, disgusting things was right up the alley for these kids.

It was hysterical.

I appreciate the teachers using opportunities to get these kids comfortable with speaking in front of groups–many adults can’t do that. Yes, there were some students you could hardly hear because of their soft voices, but Cal was loud and clear. And he seemed quite comfortable with being a bat.

There are lots of things or situations that make me squirm. I can speak in front of a group, but I panic before it happens. I don’t want to look foolish or act like I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m not fearful of heights or snakes, but being around critical people makes me squirm uncomfortably.

Being alone in the dark is my big nemesis. When I’m home alone at night, I hear every creak, every bough brushing a window, every small sound that I immediately magnify into someone trying to break into my home.

That’s when I squirm the most.

We’re all afraid or uncomfortable with something. How we deal with our discomfort says a lot about the kind of people we are.

Abraham waited twenty-five years for a son after God had promised him that his wife would bear him a son. Initially, when the promise wasn’t being fulfilled quickly enough, Abraham agreed to Sarah’s idea of having a child with her servant, Hagar. Sarah felt God was keeping her from having a child, so she was trying to “fix” the situation so that God’s promise would be fulfilled. In that culture, a baby born in their home could be raised as Sarah’s child. Then when a son was born to Hagar, Sarah blamed Abraham for the situation.

A squirmy situation to say the least.

But twenty-five years after God had promised Abraham a son, Sarah gave birth to Isaac.

When Isaac was a young man, God asked Abraham to sacrifice his son as a burnt offering to Him. Talk about a man squirming! The son he’d waited for so many years, the one promised him by God, was now to be sacrificed.

Abraham didn’t flinch. He took his son to Mount Moriah, placing the wood to be used in the sacrifice on Isaac’s shoulders, and then went up the mountain to do as God asked. Abraham prepared the altar, tied his son on top of the wood, and raised his knife to kill his son.

God stopped him.

“‘Don’t lay a hand on the boy!’ the angel said. ‘Do not hurt him in any way, for now I know that you truly fear God. You have not withheld from Me even your son, your only son.’” Genesis 22:13.

God doesn’t seek human sacrifices. He asked Abraham to sacrifice his son to test his faith and obedience. It was a way for Abraham to display his unwavering faith in the Lord, even in the face of impossible circumstances.

Cal and his friends demonstrated the benefits of slimy, creepy things with their play, a way to demonstrate that even those things we think of as disgusting have benefits for us.

The things that make us uncomfortable, whether through fear or discomfort?

There may be opportunities to grow into better people with the help of God.