James and the Cockroach

Sometimes, I feel that God would reiterate a certain lesson to me because I would the same verse many times in a day. For example, one day, my verse of the day was Job 1:21. Through the day, I was able to read it three more times in three different articles. Talk about a Living Word!

Another experience happened earlier last week. My verse of the day was James 1:19. It goes like this:

Photo: http://www.biblelockscreen.com/

I guess I was still too sleepy when I read the verse because, while I prayed for God's grace to help me with it (people who know me personally know how quick-tempered I am), and I was able to remain anger-free most of the day (despite not having a yaya around), my human faults caught up with me at bedtime.

I was sooo tired in the evening that I was excited for me and Yuri to finally climb upstairs for bedtime. Just as I opened the bedroom door, I turned on the light. That was very unusual because I never turn on the light as we already have a little automatic LED lamp.

And that's when I saw it.

There was an ugly black cockroach by the window!

I was initially shocked because the second floor of our house was usually cockroach-free. Then I hurriedly came down to give Yuri to my parents while I got a broom and the insecticide.

Once I returned to the room, the cockroach was still there. When I tried to hit it with my slipper, it went down to the floor and scurried under Yuri's crib.

That's when I started to lose my cool. If you are familiar with our sleeping arrangement, you would know that we are in a sidecar crib. The crib and my bed are tied together, so it was really hard for me to pull the bed and the crib together and look out for the cockroach.

I started to tear up as I thought of the possibility that it would crawl up to Yuri's bedding. Then, I started to get angry because no one was helping me at all. I marched downstairs and pointedly told them if they weren't going to help me. My parents declined because they already took a bath, and my mom told me I shouldn't just cry about it. I got angrier.

I marched back upstairs and cried out in frustration. Like a teenager.

Back in the room, I still could not find where the cockroach was hiding. My mom eventually came, helped me pull the bed and the crib, but kept commenting how messy the room was and how it would be really easy for a cockroach to hide there. I wasn't able to be slow to speak because I quickly retaliated that, hello, the room was messy because I was pulling the things off to find the darn cockroach.

Soon, the cockroach came out (on the side of the crib near the bedding huhuhu), and I sprayed on it and slammed it with my foot with all my might. I threw it and washed my hands so many times and by the time the room didn't smell like insecticide anymore, I took Yuri back upstairs. All I wanted to do was sleep.

After reading and praying (for Yuri), I opened my phone. Lo and behold, my verse of the day was staring me in the face. I completely failed to follow it.

Then, when I read articles and blog posts in my Pocket app, I saw the same verse twice in two different articles. I knew God was teaching me a lesson, and while I failed miserably, it only showed that I would never be godly without His grace.

I thought about the incident. The cockroach didn't come from God, but He made me turn on the light (which was not what I usually do) so that I would see it before Yuri sleeps and it would not just "jump" on us in the dark. God also made sure that it would stay outside Yuri's crib and not touch his things even when I kept going downstairs. Finally, God convicted my mom to help me (despite her nagging). Looking back, I should not have been angry but thankful instead!