I was out shopping at the pet store with my son one Friday morning. As usual, we had come to purchase cat food and pick up a box of flea treatments, and afterward we stopped to look at all the different animals available for purchase. For my son’s birthday I had wanted to buy a Betta Fish for him, but he informed me, “I don’t want a stupid fish!” so I didn’t buy one. I didn’t think he quite understood at the time what I wanted to buy for him, so I asked him if he’d like to go look at the fish. His attitude changed rather quickly, and without giving it much thought, we left the store with a new tank, bowl, and some various fish items including fish food.

Once we got home, I set up the tank with fresh well water, and we began the process of getting the fish acclimated to the water. About an hour later, he was swimming in his new tank. Towards the end of the day, he had sunk to the bottom of the bowl, still alive, but looking half dead. By the next morning, he was gone. I couldn’t figure it out! I had betta fish numerous times before, and had never had any issues. The water was ok, we put him in properly, but he still died. I began to read articles on the web to figure out where we went wrong.

We returned to the pet store the next day and bought a new fish, along with water conditioner, a new filter, live plants, and other assorted fish items that were bound to help him live. I set the tank back up, made sure the water was the proper temperature and conditioned, and then tried to slowly get him used to the new water. He looked like he was going to make it! He looked happy…for a while, and then he began to float at the top of the bowl, fins all clamped up, and he too died the next day.

During this time I felt the Lord talking to me, saying there was a message in the death of the fish. I kind of ignored it for a few days, but everyday my mind went to those two fish, thinking, “There’s a message in this.”

Many of us know that water represents the Word of God. As followers of Christ, we are submerged in His Word. We attend church, listen to preachers online, read our Bibles, and some attend numerous conferences. Some spend their entire week going from church to church, attending every event and every Bible study. We end up swimming in many different streams, but how many times do we stop and examine the quality of the water we’re swimming in? How often do we really stop and examine what we’re taking in on a daily basis?

I have found in my research of taking care of fish that water quality is of utmost importance. If we submerge our fish in tap water, chlorine can kill them. If we submerge them in contaminated water, their quality life will begin to diminish, and can even result in death.  If we are swimming in dirty streams of unfiltered water, it can cause illness, it can cause us to not look as vibrant and full of life as we should, and it can even cause death in some cases. So what does dirty, unfiltered water look like in the church? Well, it can look like a lot of things, but sometimes people will put their spin on the Word of God, trying to make it say what they want it to say, to fit their circumstances. People will also take God’s Word completely out of context and pass it off as pure, clean water when really it’s unfiltered and dirty. It’s half truths, or truth with just a little bit of a lie. By not running everything we hear through the filter of God’s Word, through the filter of Love and Grace, what we take in can poison us. We need a filter. It may look like pure, clean water to the naked eye, but once it is run through the filter, you begin to see just how contaminated the words were that you were ingesting. It’s the pure, unadulterated Word of God that brings life and vibrancy.

A complete water change is oftentimes needed, (sometimes you have to change churches to be healthy), but if the water is coming from the same source, it’s still unhealthy. The source of the words being spoken may not always be from God. You may find they’re sourced from the flesh, from the enemy (devil), or from a mixture. If you’re swimming in contaminated waters of religion, going to another religious church is not going to help you. By religious, I mean a church that is still operating from an Old Covenant mindset, and operating under the law. It’s important to find one that properly filters the Word of God and ministers grace and freedom from works.

Even when the water has been filtered properly, it’s important to introduce the fish to it slowly, or there’s the risk of shock. When a person has been conditioned to believe one way for so long, it can be shocking to them when they’re introduced to another way. It doesn’t have to take a long time – months, weeks, days, etc., but it’s best when it’s done slowly. Yes, there’s always that fish (or person) that survives the initial shock, but it can take a toll on most, taking them a while to recover. I remember walking into my first full Gospel church. Worship was happening; everybody was dancing, running in the aisles, and speaking in tongues. It was the speaking in tongues that got me. I was in shock. I’m sure I looked statuesque, standing there all wide-eyed, wondering what I had just walked into. Granted, there was no way of introducing me to it slowly – sometimes you do just have to jump in, but it did take me a bit to recover from that. It took a long while of thinking about the experience, other people introducing me to speaking in tongues, and praying about it before I was ready to give it a go. When I returned to that church, I was fully acclimated and used to what was going on.

Once met with shock, fish tend to not want to eat much, if anything, right away. I remember not wanting anything to do with speaking in tongues for a long while after that initial shock. I spit out a lot of spiritual food that day due to shock. It may take time for people to recover and to get hungry. However, once they’re over the initial shock, they begin to realize they’re starving, and they come to eat.

Over feeding the fish can be another problem. My son was rather excited to feed his fish, so he put a lot of food pellets into the tank at once. Now these little guys can only eat approximately 3 small pellets (their stomachs are approximately the size of their eyeball), so the rest of the food sinks to the bottom of the bowl and rots, releasing harmful chemicals into the tank, and poisoning the fish. I believe at least one of our fish may have had swim bladder due to overeating. Swim bladder causes them to either sink to the bottom of the tank, or float upright at the top. Many people are the same way. They continually take in more than they can digest, more than they can actively put to use, and that knowledge rots, turns into pride, and puffs them up. Just like the fish, they are suddenly on the verge of sinking, or they become lethargic, just floating at the top. Proverbs 16:18 says, “Pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall.” It is the ingested and digested food that brings health and wholeness, not the food that sits on the outside and rots, nor the food that was improperly digested.

Water changes are important as well. We are not throwing out everything we have ever learned, but we are to remove contaminates regularly – wrong belief systems, lies, etc. and replace them with pure, clean, filtered water (Truth!); Out with the old, in with the new, as they say.

Our environment is also important. We should be surrounded by life, and other people. Most fish don’t do well by themselves – they need each other. Fighting fish, like bettas on the other hand, are almost always alone. Bettas cannot stand having another in the same tank that is bigger and more colorful than they are. They feel threatened and attack. Prideful people are like that. They feel threatened when others who appear to be flashier than they are, come into their space. Attacks can be physical, or done in a roundabout way. Most times people will use their words, passing off what they say as a joke, although it’s really meant as a hurtful jab. However, if a betta is in a tank with someone who they deem smaller, and less colorful, they’re less likely to attack; they can get along for the most part.

We see this within the church quite often. People see someone they deem more qualified, better dressed, and more outgoing, and the attack is on. They may ignore the person, cut the person down, and downplay all the wonderful characteristics and abilities God has given to that particular person.

Thank God it’s possible for us to put off the characteristics of a betta fish, and put on the characteristics of the Holy Spirit – love, joy, peace, self-control, and so on!

Well, my tank is still up, but there are no fish in it. I read that it’s wise to set up a proper environment for the fish before introducing them into it. It is said it takes approximately 4-6 weeks for the tank to cycle, and before the tank is ready for its new inhabitants. This time we’re going with goldfish.