Fleas

One flea said to another flea, “Shall we walk or catch a dog?”

Believe it or not, there are 1,100 known species of fleas and each normally prefers a single type of animal. Even people can be plagued by fleas that prefer human blood to all other types. In the sixteenth century people sometimes wore fur collars to attract and trap fleas, and fashionable women of the 1800’s carried scratching sticks to relieve them of the flea bites on their backs. Today, fleas that pester human beings are relatively rare, but the insects are found in warm blooded animals, including those that spend much of their lives under water. The fleas that torment beavers and muskrats ride under water in cushions of air that are trapped in the dense fur of these animals. Thus, the fleas stay warm and dry all the time.

Because of the way fleas are designed they are very difficult to catch. Its body is flat, hard and smooth, so it will probably slip from between your thumb and forefinger even if you do succeed in trapping it there. The flea has tiny spines along the sides that project backward and help the insect move forward through the furry jungle where it lives. Strong hind legs give this wingless little monster all the jumping power it needs to get from place to place and to avoid capture.

Fleas are the Olympic jumpers of the insect world, capable of jumping up to 18 cm vertically and up to 33 cm horizontally. That’s around 100 times their own height and length, which is like a human being able to jump over 300 meters – nearly a third of a kilometer!

If you watch a cat or dog with a bad case of fleas, you can imagine how miserable it must be. It will not stop scratching no matter what it is doing. The poor animal can do nothing but go after the symptoms of itching. The scratching momentarily relieves the itch, but the fleas are still there. So, the best thing that can be done for the animal is rid it of its fleas. In my dairy farming days I used to baptise the cattle dog in a water trough, and this would rid it of fleas.

We can sometimes relieve the symptoms of sin in our lives by self-control, by changing our environment, and so on. But only as we allow Jesus into our lives can we truly be rid of the sin itself. I was once a drinking, smoking, profane and immoral person, but then I allowed Jesus and His Holy Spirit into my life, and my life was changed. I was washed, cleansed and forgiven.