The Rat that Came to Bible Study*

The people sitting across from us saw our faces before they saw the rat. We had left the door open, and the rat decided the church fellowship hall looked awfully inviting; it had been raining after all.

The look of horror on our faces set everyone asking, "What?" Those who could see it screamed, "A rat! A rat!" Until those who couldn't see it (the rat had walked behind their ankles) started screaming too. The pastor embraced her friend sitting next to her and several others jumped up on their chairs. Pandemonium.

The rat raced for the back of the fellowship hall. We all looked at each other for a minute.  Then someone said, "We must catch it." The bravest jumped up and went after the it with a trash can. They caught it and dumped it outside. We shut the door.

The rat definitely makes the top ten list for interesting-things-that-have-happened at Bible study.* And yet, I'm not completely surprised it was there. The experience made me think of how the demon in Screwtape Letters describes how he had gotten an atheist to not think about God by reminding him that it was time for lunch.

Distraction is one of Satan's best tools. He encourages rats to come to Bible study. He encourages people in church to notice the odd colored carpet, the comment a friend made before church, the off-key singer, the text message coming in, the hunger pains--anything, anything but the message that the listener must hear for that day.

Lord, may I never be distracted when you are moving on my heart.

*Technically, it was our scripture recitation group meeting. We meet together once a month a recite the scripture we memorized that month. See  http://www.irecite.org/.