You're in limited preview mode.

Login or signup for free to unlock more content.

Life Lessons From Cockroaches

Emotions Knowledge Love (Divine)

Source: Fact or Fiction?: A Cockroach Can Live without Its Head, SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, retrieved 2/23/22

Link to Source: Click here to view source

Contributed By: Illustration Exchange | Date Posted: 2022-05-05

Scripture: 1 Corinthians 8:1 ; Proverbs 3:5

Author: Illustration Exchange
4

ILLUSTRATION

Cockroaches are fascinating creatures. Did you know that they can continue living days, even weeks, after being decapitated. That’s because their blood pressure, circulation, and respiration is not controlled by their brains. They can feel and sense and amble about, appearing whole, though headless. And what’s even creepier is that their heads will survive also. Yet neither will survive effectively. 

The body will roam around aimlessly, with no memory or mission, until it finally starves to death (seems they do at least need the head to eat). The head will also survive, with antennae strobing, responding to stimuli, consciously aware of its surroundings, but unable to move or make any impact on its environment. Two separated parts of one body – alive, yet utterly ineffectual. Check out this video.

APPLICATION

So often, we Christians are like decapitated cockroaches. Some of us walk around all all caught up in our feelings. We care deeply about people or issues. We even interpret Scripture or make assessments of God’s will based on our “feelings” about a given issue, circumstance, or situation.

Others of us walk around like a head without a heart. We have tons of knowledge, but lack grace, compassion, or empathy. In short, we lack God’s agape love. We spout knowledge as if knowledge alone can have effectual impact.

The Christian must think, respond, react with their entire being. Feelings without thoughtfulness, knowledge, wisdom, can leave us reactionary, grounded in our own senses, rather than in the truth and mind of God. Knowledge without feelings – or better said, heart, compassion, empathy, agape love – simply puffs up. 

Like the cockroach, our hearts and minds must be in touch with each other, working in a symbiotic relationship if we are to minister the “whole” counsel of God.

“… Knowledge puffs up, but love edifies.” 1 Cor 8:1 (NKJV)

“If I speak in the tongues[a] of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.  If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.  If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.” 1 Cor 13:1-3 (NIV)

“Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding [e.g., feelings or emotions]. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.” Prov 3:5-6

The Topography of Tears

Sorrow Emotions Empathy

Source: THE TOPOGRAPHY OF TEARS by Rose-Lynn Fisher

Link to Source: Click here to view source

Contributed By: Illustration Exchange | Date Posted: 2014-05-29

Scripture: Psalms 56:8 ; Revelation 7:17

Author: Illustration Exchange
7

ILLUSTRATION

Ever wondered what your tears really look like? Rose-Lynn Fisher did. "One day I wondered if my tears of grief would look any different from my tears of happiness - and I set out to explore them up close."

"The Topography of Tears" she says, "is a study of 100 tears photographed through a standard light microscope. The project began in a period of personal change, loss, and copious tears. … Years later, this series comprises a wide range of my own and others’ tears, from elation to onions, as well as sorrow, frustration, rejection, resolution, laughing, yawning, birth and rebirth, and many more, each a tiny history."?

In photographing these various tears, she discovered that they are not unlike snowflakes--each one unique in its composition and design. Tears of joy looked nothing like tears of sorrow. And tears of elation looked nothing like the tears we shed when chopping an onion.

They can be explained, in part, by the chemistry of our tears:

Joseph Stromberg of the Smithsonian’s Collage of Arts and Sciences explained that there are three major types of tears: basal, reflex, and psychic (triggered by emotions). All tears contain organic substances including oils, antibodies, and enzymes and are suspended in salt water. Different types of tears have distinct molecules. Emotional tears have protein-based hormones including the neurotransmitter leucine enkephalin, which is a natural painkiller that is released when we are stressed. Plus, the tears seen under the microscope are crystallized salt and can lead to different shapes and forms. So even psychic tears with the same chemical composition can look very different. 

"The random compositions I find in magnified tears often evoke a sense of place," says Fisher, "like aerial views of emotional terrain."*

Although the empirical nature of tears is a chemistry of water, proteins, minerals, hormones, antibodies and enzymes, the topography of tears is a momentary landscape, transient as the fingerprint of someone in a dream. This series is like an ephemeral atlas ….

Tears are the medium of our most primal language in moments as unrelenting as death, as basic as hunger, and as complex as a rite of passage. They are the evidence of our inner life overflowing its boundaries, spilling over into consciousness. Wordless and spontaneous, they release us to the possibility of realignment, reunion, catharsis: shedding tears, shedding old skin. It’s as though each one of our tears carries a microcosm of the collective human experience, like one drop of an ocean.

*Follow the link to source above to view their "topography" to understand just how personal tears are and how unique they are to our life experience.

APPLICATION

It seems our tears are indeed an atlas of our life experience--the hills and valleys, the quiet streams and the raging oceans. As varied and sundry as our tears may be, it is so comforting to know that God tracks every one of them. He sees them. He knows them. He feels them. Whether in joy or sorrow, we are never alone in our tears.

"You keep track of all my sorrows. You have collected all my tears in your bottle. You have recorded each one in your book" (Psalm 56:8, NLT).

"For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes" (Revelation 7:17, ESV).

No Laughing Matter

Emotions Guidance Motivation

Source: "Rare Disorder Makes N.J. Woman Fall Asleep When She Laughs," Published May 25, 2011, FoxNews.com

Link to Source: Click here to view source

Contributed By: Illustration Exchange | Date Posted: 2011-05-28

Scripture: Proverbs 3:5

Author: Illustration Exchange
10

ILLUSTRATION

A headline this past week really caught my eye, “Rare Disorder Makes N.J. Woman Fall Asleep When She Laughs.”  I’ve heard of sleep walking, but never sleep laughing.  Turns out the New Jersey homemaker, Claire Scott, suffers from a rare condition called cataplexy--a sleep disorder wherein the sleep center in the brain is wired incorrectly, allowing the REM sleep cycle (the time of deep sleep when one’s muscles are effectively paralyzed) to inappropriately crossover into one’s state of consciousness.   It is, in other words, a sort of emotionally induced paralysis, the effects of which can last anywhere from a few seconds to several minutes.

The trigger mechanism can be any sudden surge of emotion—fear, anger, even happiness.  In Ms. Scott’s case, her trigger is laughter.  As many as 50 times a day, she suddenly finds herself in a puddle on the floor, slumped in her chair, or face down in her plate of food.  Sadly, it’s no laughing matter.  She has young children and cannot trust herself to care for them safely.

APPLICATION

Emotions are beautiful things.  They make our lives rich and full.  But being driven by our emotions can leave us with a sort of spiritual paralysis which can effectively render us useless.  Fear can often stop us in our tracks. Yet the Lord commands us to “fear not.”  Grief can drop us to our knees, though often not in prayer but in despair.  Yet the Lord commands us to “rejoice always.”  Bitterness and resentment can short circuit our relationships.  Yet the Lord commands us to “let no root of bitterness” take hold in our hearts.  Even happiness, when it is our happiness alone that we seek, can render us limp in our service to others.  If we are to keep our spiritual legs under us so that we can live effectively for the Kingdom, we have to rise above our emotions and live by the higher standard of the Word of God.  “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding emotional impressions of the situation.  In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will direct your paths” (Proverbs 3:5-6).

Decision Barometer

Decision Making Morality Emotions

Contributed By: Illustration Exchange | Date Posted: 2011-01-27

Scripture: John 14:6

Author: Byron Sherwin
3

This is Premium Content.

To see the full illustration, please Sign Up or

Woman Who Threw Burrito Sentenced to Work in Fast Food

Empathy Justice Punishment

Contributed By: Da Al | Date Posted: 2024-03-11

Scripture: Philippians 2:3 ; Romans 12:19

Author: Da Al
0

This is Premium Content.

To see the full illustration, please Sign Up or

Put Down the Rope

Forgiveness Freedom Anger

Contributed By: Matt Williams | Date Posted: 2023-05-24

Scripture: Luke 17:3 ; Colossians 3:13

Author: Corrie ten Boom
3

This is Premium Content.

To see the full illustration, please Sign Up or

When Life Gives You Circumstances, Don't Make Lemons

Circumstances Fruit of the Spirit Attitude

Contributed By: Illustration Exchange | Date Posted: 2022-06-26

Scripture: Galatians 6:7 ; Deuteronomy 30:19

Author: Illustration Exchange
9

This is Premium Content.

To see the full illustration, please Sign Up or

You Can’t Want It More Than They Do

Recovery (Substance Abuse) Compassion Ministry

Contributed By: Illustration Exchange | Date Posted: 2022-01-15

Author: Mitchell Dillon
4

This is Premium Content.

To see the full illustration, please Sign Up or

Bring A Better Face

Attitude Christlikeness Perspective

Contributed By: Kevin Truett | Date Posted: 2019-10-17

Scripture: Ephesians 4:31 ; Romans 13:14

Author: Kevin Truett
7

This is Premium Content.

To see the full illustration, please Sign Up or

Prairie Schooners

Missions Compassion Servanthood

Contributed By: James Miller | Date Posted: 2018-10-06

Scripture: Matthew 25:29 ; Matthew 28:18

Author: James Miller
11

This is Premium Content.

To see the full illustration, please Sign Up or