Do You Feel Trapped?
A mouse and I are in a showdown. I have it corralled, and I’m hoping it follows its appetites to its demise inside the bait station I’ve set up. Lovely, I know.
As I write, here at the tail end of the cold weather, all the critters have tired of searching for food that seems ever more elusive. This hungry little mouse found a way into the warmth and abundance of my home.
Did it know that I have always outsourced pest problems to my husband? Perhaps. But chivalry is handcuffed when your husband is deployed half the world away. My knight can’t rescue me from this tiny creature who had me texting friends in all caps and standing on a kitchen chair.
When I first saw it, I had visions of the old lady in the movie Ratatouille. Do you remember her? She’s the one shooting her house up with a shotgun after she discovers rats in her kitchen.
I have a shotgun, I thought. Nope, that’s a terrible idea.
Smash it with a shovel? Ugh. Yuck!
Flamethrower? Do I have a blowtorch? Nope and nope. This house is a rental. That would make my friendship with the owners rather awkward.
Clearly, this is an aspect of adulting I haven’t mastered.
Putting my fear and disgust aside for a moment, I muster some sympathy for the little creature. She’s only a little mouse in a big world, after all. She’s going about her business, trying to make a living and support her family.
Ever feel like that? I do. We’re hustling, day in and day out. We sometimes light upon what appears to be a jackpot, a golden opportunity. Maybe it’s a promotion, a new home, or a new baby. Any of these can make life seem sunny and bright for a time. A wave of optimism hits us. We can come in from the bleak front yard and gorge ourselves in a warm, crumb-laden haven. Security feels attainable.
We glide along in our new bliss for a while. Suddenly, the walls close in. A diagnosis, a job loss, a betrayal of trust, or the sudden death of a loved one turns our security into panic, our hope into despair. The traps of this life are dark and unavoidable.
Like a mouse hemmed in by a savvy pest control expert, we can’t get out. Our enemy is bigger than us. Circumstances block our way to that bright, secure life we saw in our mind’s eye. (It was a fantasy, anyway.)
The trap is set with all kinds of unhealthy addictions we can use to cope as bait. What is the bait in your life? Is it coping with wine? Stress relief through shopping? Selfishness and an abdication of your responsibilities masquerading as “self-care?”
Our condition is pitiable, is it not? There is a force more powerful than ourselves who seeks to destroy us. Not from fear and disgust, like me wanting to trap this mouse. Satan seeks our destruction because misery loves company. He will lead us toward all the bait that looks delicious but is poison for our souls.
The good news is that, unlike my little rodent adversary, we will see life on the other side of this life’s traps and trials. The key—and we often forget this—is that the only way to the life we dream of is through death.
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“Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life” (Romans 6:3-4 ESV).
I won’t unpack all the theology in those two verses. Suffice it to say, in order to rise from the dead, we must first be dead.
C.S. Lewis, in his finale to the Chronicles of Narnia, The Last Battle, imagines this death as an earthy stable door:
“I feel in my bones,” said Poggin, “that we shall all, one by one, pass through that dark door before morning. I can think of a hundred deaths I would rather have died.”
“It is indeed a grim door,” said Tirian. “It is more like a mouth.”
“Oh, can’t we do anything to stop it?” said Jill in a shaken voice.
“Nay, fair friend,” said Jewel, nosing her gently. “It may be for us the door to Aslan’s country and we shall sup at his table tonight” (The Last Battle, 146).
And they did. “They all stood beside Aslan, on his right side, and looked through the open doorway.”Even though the door looked grim, it was the gateway to life with Aslan, in his country.
For us, just like my little mouse, the trials of this life can look quite grim. We can feel (and be!) trapped by our circumstances and unable to resist poisonous bait.
Christ, the real Aslan, uses our weaknesses and death as his opportunity to pick us up and carry us across the threshold of his heavenly home. We will one day revel in the security and bounty of life forever with the Father. I can’t wait to sup with you all at his glorious table!
is a homeschooling mom of five and proud Navy wife. She works hard to be what Chesterton called a “Jill-of-all-trades,” chronically trying new projects for the sheer joy of exploration. She’s addicted to coffee, enjoys dark beer, and loves to be in the mountains. She writes at HomeschoolFamilyCulture.com, and you can find her on Instagram @rhikutzer.
