Itchy, swelling, blistering skin due to contact with some hostile poison.  The doctor’s quick and flippant diagnosis did alleviate some concern about this being a larger problem; however, the constant itching was not alleviated so easily.

When I scratched it got way worse, and my skin would flare up, often spreading the blisters.  Even still, that itch…sometimes it would be incomprehensible, other times it would be mild, but at other times it would be all I could think about.   I would be driven crazy until the thought came: ‘a little scratch couldn’t hurt too bad, could it?’

I think most of us have had a similar experience, whether it was chicken pox when we were young, some encounter with poison ivy or oak or whatever, or even the yearly irritation of mosquitoes.  That familiar and loathed sensation of an itch that shouldn’t be scratched.  Our body is screaming for attention, and yet our mind, our common sense, and our past experiences tell us to resist.

Resist or else.

As I have struggled with this itchiness over the past 4 days I have lost some battles.  I have scratched many times, and each time the temporary relief was far overshadowed by the pain, swelling, and increasing itch that followed.  I would remind myself…’never again, just resist’.  Sometimes, when the itch got really bad, I would trick myself into thinking that if I just x’ed it instead of scratching it that would be better.  You know, dig an ‘x’ into my skin where the itch was.  Unfortunately, the result was the same, there was no clever way around it.  My scheming only pushed the poison deeper into my skin increasing the inflammation.

Eventually I resigned myself to the difficult truth, resistance was the only way out.   I sought help in the area of resistance because alone I felt overwhelmed.  I found with the help of a topical cream intended to lessen the

sensations.

The parallels to our Christian walk are many in this example.  In Eastern branches of Christianity, their understanding of sin has a nuance to ours in the west.  Instead of sin being something we choose to do, sin is more like a poison or disease that we are all infected with.  It is in each of us threatening to take us over.  This nuance of sins nature helps us to strategize against it.  It is like the struggle against a poison.  That brings heightened emphasis on a verse that instructs us to resist.

Learn from the mosquito, poison ivy, or your bout with chicken pox.

Resistance is our only chance.  Resistance and the help of God’s Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit reminds us not to scratch and gives us the strength to resist long enough for the itch to subside.  The more we trust in the Spirit’s strength to overcome the it ch, the less intense the itch seems.  Jesus promised to send us the Helper, and thank God He did.