Bugs & Stuff

by John Comer

Let the land produce living creatures . . .” (Genesis 1:24).

“Praise the Lord . . . small creatures . . .” (Psalm 148:7-10).

Ecology. We live it every moment. Yes, I know some folks take it too far. Some government programs and certain organizations go to ridiculous extremes. They’re the folks who give ecology a bad name.

But all the creepy, crawling, flying critters were made by God. They’re his. And ours. They’re part of a food chain and mutual benefit society that keeps the world working. God created them. On purpose. They’re here, and we’re here. We have to share.

Ecology has to do with the relationship between everything that shares an environment. But when a cricket begins chirping in the bedroom at about 11:00 p.m., the relationship is so far out of balance as to have reached the critical stage, and the only good bug is a dead bug. Even so God has worked them into his plans, and so must I. Sometimes my plans include a can of bug spray.

I hope we were never intended to learn to love fleas and flies, rats and roaches. But who can say? Maybe inside the obnoxious little body of some such vermin is hidden the substance that holds the cure for the common cold or cancer. Then we’d wish we’d been nicer to them.

In some of his writing, Dr. William Barclay imparts a certain nobility even to the common earthworm. He suggests that when the worm is busy casting soil in the garden, that is a form of the worm’s service and worship to God because it is doing exactly what God intends earthworms to do.

Can it be that ecology overlaps theology? If we were as busy doing what God intends humans to do as the earthworm and his lowly friends are in doing what God intends them to do, the kingdom of heaven might be closer at hand. I’ve never seen even a housefly being anything except what God intends houseflies to be.

We share space with these small creatures. Can we learn from them, too? Ecological theology (theological ecology?) could become an embarrassment for the human species.