I was pastoring in a small town in North Carolina. I had not been there even a year when I realized my training had missed some important issues. This first struck me when a rumor circulated that a certain family in the church had head lice.
Of course, nobody wanted to talk to them about it. But when the whispers persisted, something had to be done. I was equipped to talk to people about their sin, but I had never dug too deeply into how to approach people about lice.
I remembered that the Scriptures had spoken of lice during the plagues of Egypt, so I did a careful exegesis of the verses only to find that the more recent translations said “gnats” instead of “lice.”
So my wife and I finally went to see the family and told them we’d heard they might have a lice problem, which was not actually news to them. We gave them all the practical advice we could and were very pleased at how graciously they received it. They assured us they would deal with the problem. We scratched our heads all the way home, but we felt we had done the right thing.
Freebie fleas
A couple of months later, the church was preparing a large yard sale to raise money to send two young women overseas for short-term missionary service. For several weeks, we collected anything people would donate and stored it in an unused room in the church. Unfortunately, some of the donated clothes must have come from a house that had dogs or cats. A few days before the sale, some ladies went to the room to sort everything; they were promptly attacked by hundreds of fleas and made a forced retreat.
I know only a couple places in 1 Samuel that mention anything about fleas, neither of which was of much use in this situation. I went to the store and bought some aerosol bombs and launched a counter attack, and we were able to contain and conquer them. Some of them, though, probably went as freebies with clothing bought at the yard sale.
Return of the lice
Shortly the lice returned. Mothers came running to me saying they could not leave their children in the nursery anymore because a certain child (same family as before) had lice. One mother said she wouldn’t return to church until the lice problem was dealt with.
Guess who had to deal with it.
The next morning, a Monday, I met with some local pastors, as is our custom. I decided to ask the wise counsel of these who had more experience in the ministry. I prefaced my question by telling them I needed advice on a serious church problem, and then I laid out the problem.
There was hardly a dry eye in the place—from laughing, not crying.
Little help there.
That night I visited the family again, once more getting their assurance that they would deal with the problem. I was again amazed at how well they received what I said.
Some will NOT handle snakes
I almost resigned a few weeks later when I stood up from my desk to leave my study, and between me and the door lay a snake—a copperhead.
Let me explain that we are situated right in the middle of town. The church has a very nice modern office, fully carpeted, computer, the works.
What was a snake doing in my office?
As I climbed on top of my desk, I reflected on the Scriptures and quickly realized they gave me a lot clearer direction on how to deal with a snake than with fleas and lice. I would take dominion over him. No non-essential doctrine this time; this fellow had to go.
I am aware that the King James Version of the Bible says we can take up serpents, but my NIV says the two oldest manuscripts leave that out. I decided to take the scholarly position and go with the NIV. I do know that both versions say the offspring of the woman would crush the serpent’s head, which is what I did.
Not intending in any way to take away from the prophetic significance of those verses, I obeyed them to the letter. Standing on top of the desk, I picked up a and threw it down on top of the snake. That dazed him long enough for me to jump down and catch him under the leg of the chair. Then, standing on top of the chair, I continued to crush his head with repeated blows of the concordance. When the job was thoroughly done, I cast him into outer darkness beside the building.
I’m hoping for no more pests any time soon, but as I sit here looking at the broken back on my concordance, I wonder if I have been rightly dividing the Word of Truth.
David Carson Plymouth Christian Church 6100 Rock Service Station Rd. Raleigh NC 27603 davcarson@mindspring.com
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