Recently a friend asked me if I had ever been kicked by a horse. Well, the answer is "yes;" I have been kicked by a horse. As it turns out, the horse wasn't aiming for my leg, but for another horse. Unfortunately, he was a bad shot, and I went down like a bowling pin. Trying to break up a horse fight is not a very good idea and is a good way to get hurt.
Sometimes people get hurt because they try to break up a cat fight, a dog fight, or maybe a couple of neighbors who are fighting. Proverbs 20:17 says, "He that passeth by, and meddleth with strife belonging not to him is like one that taketh a dog by the ears." That is to say that
buying trouble that you could get for free is not a very good idea. All of us have trouble because we are people, and people have conflict with other people. It is generally not a wise thing to try to step in when two people are fighting, to buy into a fight that you don't own.
The Bible says that when I step into trouble that doesn't belong to me, it is just like a man who takes a dog by the ears. If you would like to do something really dumb today, and I don't think you do, then go home and throw a raw steak to your Rottweiler, Brutus. Once he gets his fangs dug deep into that steak, grab him by the ears. You have two hands, for now, and he has two ears; so just pick him up off the ground and see what happens. What is going to happen is that he is going to get his steak whether it is on the floor or the front of your face. It is not a good idea to pick up a dog by the ears.
When you meddle with trouble that doesn't belong to you, you don't know the facts. It is best to know what is going on before you jump in the middle of it.
Also, many times, jumping in to the trouble doesn't remedy the real problem. All of us have friends who are having trouble, and I think it is fine and wise to give counsel at times when it is asked for and God gives us the guidance to do it. But we need the good sense to know when a fight is worth joining and when it is not a matter of conviction, but of pride or personality. In such cases it is not wise for me to take ownership of something that does not belong to me.
Prayer Requests: - Meetings this week in
Park Rapids, MN 
No comments:
Post a Comment