Deer Ticks

Do you have a favorite kind of tick? I would hope not! Those little bugs only serve to feed other nicer animals. They also serve to remind us of the kind of spiritual warfare we must wage.

I sent in a nymph deer tick to the TickLab last week for analysis. Nymph deer ticks look like a poppy seed, but spread diseases worse than all other ticks. How can something so small and so insignificant yet cause so much damage?

Thomas Brooks writes, “there is no little sin, because there is no little God to sin against.” Temptation is as deceptive as a nymph deer tick. Satan uses the numbing agent of our own pride, comfort, and self-justification to lead us to bite the bit and be lead astray. We pay little attention in the backyard and soon enough discover the little speck has grown; the dot on our skin looked small but now we face a fever unawares.

While the blood-borne illnesses of such little “ticks” cause calamity and destruction, yet there is a cure. Perhaps we deal with the consequences of those sins in this life, yet Brooks’s quote reminds us that the weight of our sin only points us to the majesty of our God. He who knew no sin came to us for the very purpose of saving us (1 Timothy 1:13–16). Through His blood we have redemption, the forgiveness of our sins (Ephesians 1:7). He brings no mere antibiotic but changes the heart of each sinner. Surely this is no little God!

Our task is to be more appalled by sin than we are of ticks. But then to be even more grateful for the goodness of our God in Christ Jesus. I may not yet know the diseases the tick carries, but I can ever grow in the knowledge heaven brings in the saving work of Christ Jesus. 

Pastor Chris