Missionary Mosquito

                    

Ouuch….Oops…aah…thus we were crying out by the mosquito bite on a nice evening in Bangkok. I was returning from the chapel after our daily 5pm mass along with the Father. While I was complaining about the cruelty of mosquitoes Fr who never runs out of funny stories & jokes told me about mosquito Evangelization. Having never heard of it before, I forgot the painful drilling for a moment and asked him eagerly what does it mean? He replied, "It is said that when we do evangelization we are supposed to be like mosquitoes! They have a very short life time but in that lifespan their aim is to bite maximum number of people who come across their way. Same way we have a very short life span, we should try to evangelize as many people as possible, who come across our daily life".

I laughed and we quickly dispersed trying to escape from the mosquitoes. Back home this new term came back to my mind again and again, I am not sure if it is the mosquito humming in my ears or the Spirit calling me to ponder more on this. Thoughts flied back to my first year in college. I was straight from my first Jesus Youth retreat during the holidays. Full of zeal and joy of Christ I baldy wanted to tell people about the love of Christ and for that matter to start a prayer meeting in college. I walked around, talked to all, made friends and waited for the right moment. But there was one problem.

Being a perfectionist I was not yet ready to start the prayer meeting. The reason – I am not even in the first 10 ranks in my class! How can I - a child of God tell others about the love of God and the victorious God when I myself was struggling to cross the 65% 'honour' line in engineering? Let me try hard and score well and then I can start a prayer meeting – I decided. No marks for guessing when that moment finally cameJ

I believe each one of us face this same situation or throw up similar excuses when faced with the question of evangelization. Let me become holy first…let me finish this work….let me complete the exams...let me finish the appraisal…let me change job…let me decide on my marriage…n the list goes on endlessly. Going back to our mosquitoes I did a Google search on mosquito bite to see how effective they are in their 'mission'. The results were shocking - mosquitoes are the most deadly animal found on land and on water overtaking African Lion, Elephant & even great white shark! [http://listverse.com/2007/07/13/top-10-most-deadly-animals/]. They kill over 2 million people every year and infect another 70 million with deadly diseases!!!

Now imagine each mosquito to be an evangelizer or a catholic or even a Jesus Youth! We would have got 2 million people who get to know Jesus every year or another 70 million who will start their quest for God. Are we missing the killer instinct when it comes to telling the story of Jesus? Next time you try to find an excuse, remember the Oouch…n aahasJ

Disclaimer: Evangelization should not hurt/disturb/irritate people; it should be done gently through utmost respect and love for the hearer.