What Lurks Behind the Door?

by Jaimie Lancaster

We have an outbuilding adjacent to our house in Uruguay. If we had the money, it is where the maid would stay. The building has a small room for a bed, a bathroom with a shower, and room for a washer and dryer. For us, it serves as a laundry room and storage.

One evening, my wife Tammy burst into the house, short of breath, looking as if she had seen a ghost. I asked her what was wrong, and she told me a snake—or some kind of animal—had come out of the toilet tank. I went out and looked. Sure enough, I saw an opening on the top of the tank about as big as my thumb. I looked closely and hit the tank with a stick, but nothing appeared. I chalked Tammy’s excitement up to her being out there without her glasses.

A week later, I opened the door and our uninvited guest was there. I could see the tip of his head sticking out of the hole. I flushed the toilet, hoping he had disappeared for good. The next night, he was back.

We took the mysterious invader’s picture and tried searching the Internet, but couldn’t figure out what it was. We left for a visit to the States, warning our house sitters about the monster that had invaded the laundry room. They entered cautiously for the two weeks we were gone. They saw it a couple of times, and it even growled at them.

For three weeks after we returned, we didn’t see our unwanted guest. We speculated that perhaps it had just used our laundry as a place to raise other little monsters and then departed. Still, we checked the tank and made noise every time we entered, but we no longer saw the monster. Life was good…until I opened the door.

It was a frog! I ran back to the house and got Tammy. We confirmed the growling and hissing, evil-eyed monster was, in fact, a little frog. We had a good laugh about how much misery this frog caused others and us.

Fear is like that. We usually imagine things are worse than they are. We make our “monsters” grow until they become powerful enough to change the way we view the world. When we finally face our fears, they may not be all that pleasant (it was still a frog), but usually it’s not as bad as we think.  

Let’s live fearlessly.
  
There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love (1 John 4:18).

About the Writer: Jaimie Lancaster and his wife Tammy work in Uruguay, a hard place to share the gospel and plant churches. For 17 years they have enthusiastically, creatively, and fearlessly shared the gospel. Learn more: www.fwbgo.com.