Catching bugs

I now have the power to catch any bug that crawls.

I was recently at the grocery store—where a lot of pivotal, life-changing moments seem to happen to me—when my klutziness got the best of me. I was reaching for something on the top shelf and somehow managed to knock down a jar of maraschino cherries. Those glass jars are not very durable when falling from lofty spots, so it shattered, and that sticky red juice and a bunch of cherries littered all over aisle 7 floor before I could even blink twice.

Oops.

I was frantically trying to find something to clean it up, and I definitely had nothing to be able to tackle such a mess. I had already had a pretty rough day, and this was just the cherry (or cherries, rather) on top. It really just wasn't a good moment in my life, and I guess it showed.

Small yet so powerful

A little boy was with his mom on this aisle and walked up to me as I was trying to pick up all of the syrup-coated cherries from the ground. He handed me what I thought looked like a cheap toy and said, "Here, I think you need this. It made me happy when I got it, and it might even help you pick those up."

What he gave me, his mom told me, was a bug catcher that he had gotten in his kids' meal at Sonic. She said he thought it was the coolest thing, and we both agreed that it was sweet of him to offer it to me. I tried to give it back to him so he could keep it and enjoy it, but he wouldn't let me.

It amazes me how the minds of little kids work. They are so innocent, and they think and act directly from the heart. They don't have to overanalyze things, and they often don't even think twice before they act. It brought a smile to my heart to have this little boy give me a toy that he thought was so amazing—even if it is a device used to capture gross creatures.

What would the world be like if we were all so selfless? I started thinking about it, and I can't say that I am always so willing to give up items that I hold dear. Heck, sometimes I am even hesitant to give the important intangibles (like the always needed time) to others. But Jesus didn't just give up something small for us—he gave up his entire life. Whether my new friend in the grocery store knew it or not, he was being like Jesus to a stranger on aisle 7 that day.

That bug catcher really did work that day, because I actually caught a bug: the love bug. (Cheesy? Of course.) It's so important to spread love to others, and this incident was just one more reminder of that. It didn't matter anymore that I had exhibited my lack of grace for an entire grocery store of people to see; what mattered was that someone showed me kindness in a flawed moment, and I felt the warmth of love envelope me.

We can learn a lot from children, especially when it comes to loving with no boundaries and giving freely.

Oh, and catching bugs.