I wish I had a dollar for every time I've sneezed in my lifetime. I believe I'd be a millionaire. Seriously. My sneezes typically come in threesomes, but occasionally I'll sneeze four or five times in a row. I've heard, "God bless you!" a lot. Prior to having a tonsillectomy last year, I tallied twenty to thirty sneezes a day. Post tonsillectomy, I'm down to six or so a day. But recently, with pollen season at its peak, so is the sneezing.
The University of Rochester Medical Center's website explains a sneeze this way:
"Everybody sneezes. You can try to hold it back, but a sneeze usually just can't be stopped. And that's a good thing, because it's actually one of the body's natural defenses, designed to help get rid of foreign invaders that sneak into your nose and threaten your lungs and other body parts. The medical term for sneezing is sternutation, a rather complex process that includes your brain, nerves, and muscles all over your body.
Your nose is lined with tiny hairs called cilia that catch foreign invaders, such as dust, pollen, dander, and other allergens flying around in the air. When these particles start tickling your nose, your brain is sent a message to get them out. Your brain triggers the sneeze response, and the force of the sneeze helps expel the offenders from the nose.
A sneeze seems fairly straightforward, but it’s the result of an impressive chain of events. Your abdominal muscles, chest muscles, and even eyelid muscles (think about how your eyes automatically close when you sneeze) are all in play, in concert with your lungs, which initiate the forceful air that is sent up through your windpipe, throat, and nasal passages."
Sometimes, foreign invaders try to enter my life too. Anger, jealousy and gossip, to name a few. A multitude of unholy actions attempt to take over. I'm reminded of Paul's words in Colossians 3. He talks about what we need to do to these foreign invaders:
"...now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. 9 Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices 10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator."
When foreign invaders attempt to enter my life, I have the ultimate protection available. I'm able to "sneeze" off those things with the help of an Almighty God who offers an impenetrable armor against those sneaky forces.
God bless you!
