Banging on the Window Pane

Saturday night I stayed up kind of late working on food for our Sunday lunch.  I kept hearing a really loud banging noise coming from the den.  I was a little worried about the noise, so went and checked it out.

We have two big windows side by side on the back of that room facing the back yard.  They are without window coverings. I had the big lights on in the room and so I quickly realized that the noise was bugs banging the window panes, trying to get to the light.  It seemed so strange that the bugs were harming themselves by trying to get to the light, but then, of course, the window pane is clear and bugs don't have thought processes that would warn them of danger, so they don't know any better.

But then I wondered why bugs do that?  Why are they attracted to light, anyway?  I found the following explanation from authors Mark Leynor and Billy Goldberg:

Phototaxis is an organism’s automatic movement toward or away from light. Cockroaches are negatively phototactic. Turn on that kitchen light and off they scurry to their dark little holes. But many insects are positively phototactic – as evidenced by teh mass bug graves in your light fixtures. Many people are also phototactic, especially for the “limelight” – those of us who secretly crave the strobe fusillade of paparazzi flashbulbs and murmer, “Mr. DeMille, I’m ready for my close-up” in our dreams… But, back to bugs. There are a variety of reasons that various insects are positively phototactic. Many insects, including bees, orient themselves in relation to the sun. Certain nocturnal bugs – moths, for instance – use moonlight to navigate, flying at a certain angle to the moon’s light rays to maintain a straight trajectory. When it approaches a source closer than the moon – say, a lightbulb – a moth perceives the light as stronger in one eye than the other, causing one wing to beat faster, so it flies in a tightening spiral, ever closer the the light. Some bugs are sensitive to ultraviolet light reflected by flowers at night. Artificial lights that emit UV rays will also be attractive to these guys. Other bugs are drawn to the heat that incandescent bulbs produce at night. Fireflies are bugs and bulbs all in one. They use their bioluminescence to attract each other.


Pretty interesting, isn't it?


You know.....we should be like bugs that are attracted to the light because Jesus is the light.

When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” 

John 8:12

If we're not attracted to the light there is something wrong in our spiritual lives!

But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin.

1 John 1:6-8

But sadly, some of us are attracted to the light, but like the bugs I watched last night.....we keep bumping into window panes.....or getting side-tracked in other ways.  Maybe we're allowing the things of the world to get in the way of our reaching the light.  Maybe we're giving in to sin....treading closer to darkness than to light.  Or maybe God is testing us with obstacles to strengthen our faith, but we're having a hard time facing those tests.  Maybe we keep banging on the window pane...unable to reach the light we are wanting to.

God can help us reach the light - the light of His Son and Our Savior.  He is the solution to banging on the window pane!  Our reliance on Him, our faith in Him, and our faith in he fact that His Spirit can work in us can get us past the window panes and get us to the light.

You, O Lord, keep my lamp burning; my God turns my darkness into light.

Psalm 18:28