After three days of travel, team Whispered Revival and Daughters of the Vineyard finally exited our bus and stepped into Nicaragua at 8:30pm. Our hosts had, unfortunately, been waiting three hours for our arrival. They brought us on another two hour ride before we reached the Vision Nicaragua Compound. After briefly discussing some housekeeping items, where it was fleetingly mentioned that we may need to shake out our close toed shoes every morning, the girls were greeted by a tarantula. This welcoming committee was not received with joy but screams of excitement and fear. Not to mention, everyone’s first instinct was to run away, but, as curiosity got the better of us, we swarmed around it as it started to crawl its way around the bathroom. Multiple pictures were taken, yet none of us could quite capture how the dark hair stood up from its eight elongated stocky legs. The tarantula’s hospitable greeting could have been planned out slightly better, because he obviously failed to realize just how much his burly body actually blended into the tile below him. Thankfully, one of us was ready for action and knew exactly what to do in such a situation: obtain a man to kill the spider. That man, as we found out, also knew exactly what to do in this situation: obtain a thick object in which to squash the spider. That object was a simple piece of wood. Wielding that scrap of wood with as much power as four hundred horses (that we women were obviously incapable of handling when we were in such a distressed state) he defeated the beastly spider in one colossal swing. The tarantula’s downfall resulted in a sticky mess of crimson blood that we prayed was not acquired by the villain’s ability to prey on innocent damsels. Even after the rogue met his demise, we were still wary of his presence, and consequently had a search party scour the bunk beds to see what else might attack us. As nothing was found, we hesitantly crawled in our beds, imploring our Saviour to have pity on our lives and protect us from anything else lurking in the darkness.
As we went along our week, we continued to search around our beds and bags before settling in for the night. With no new evidence of any strange creatures, our nerves were calmed. Eventually, we stopped our quest. Tarantulas still continue to appear, but we are no longer worried about their company. Let me clarify by saying that while we don’t go running from the room when we see a tarantula, we usually still grab a piece of wood to kill it. By “usually” I mean to say that we have had a tarantula chill in the shower next to our shampoo bottles for an entire day. The next morning we squished it; we couldn’t let it get too comfortable.
While tarantulas are creepy but manageable, scorpions pose another threat. Their hard reptilian bodies present you with feelings of horror. This anxiety could be due to the larger effort it takes to kill a scorpion. The first scorpion sighting left most of us living in fear. The scorpion has been found on someone’s bed. As she screamed and leapt off the bed in surprise, the scorpion quickly ran away towards my bunk bed. Not knowing where it had gone or where I would meet it next, I gingerly tried to go back to sleep but not after I conducted a thorough search of my surroundings. Hours later, we came to the conclusion that scorpions cannot run quite that fast. Thus, we concluded it had to be a gecko. The first real scorpion sighting was not even an event. I was walking to the bathroom one morning and as I was opening a stall door, one of the girls told me there was a scorpion in there. I looked and didn’t see a thing. I asked if she was sure, and she pointed out the creature to me. I said something to the tune of “huh” (I’m not sociable most mornings), closed the door, and walked on. Later, I heard someone killed it (I’m also not too active most mornings.) But, I’m not 100% positive about that.
Finding scorpions and tarantulas has become somewhat normal. I am almost positive that the majority of us would prefer to go without them, but without frequent sightings how would we manage not to be scared of them? In Psalm 56:3-4 it is written: When I am afraid I will trust in you. In God whose word I praise, in God I trust; I will not be afraid. What can mortal man do to me? When we trust in the Lord, we have no need to worry or be afraid of what could happen, because when God is with us we can overcome anything. At the same time though, God is using His own methods to help us and encourage us to overcome our fears. Tarantulas are now commonplace, not an anxiety inducing rarity. God has given us a gift of confidence in Him. He’s given us tarantulas, scorpions, and geckos that sing us to sleep.
Check it out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=viXKpN4lUIQ
