The Joneses

I promised to continue with my discourse on goats.

Sadly, my solar system has been having issues even as the sun had decided to completely hide itself behind the clouds.

Add that to the fact that my children all flocked back from distant schools and the animals required more attention even as I continued learning from God as I took care of them.

But now I have some time to share a few points.

Goats are never content with their lot. And I have done a lot of observation to come up with that.

A goat will not settle in a pasture, however good.

A goat will bite a leaf here and then run to bite another there. Then run back to bite where they left and repeat the same ad infinitum.

Take them to a lush bush and they will be scattering everywhere, biting here before rushing to take another bite somewhere else.

Let me give an analogy to help us understand.

Imagine a buffet?

A goat will not take a plate to serve food on it.

It will pick the smallest tea spoon and go round the whole place sampling from all saucepans (sufurias) again and again.

They will even dash back to the start point or anywhere else midway when they see another goat seemingly enjoying their bite

Let me get us to human nature to help us identify our goatish nature in one thing.

Why do people exchange sex partners?

I believe (and doctors will concur with me) that the physical aspect of sex is the same whoever one has sex with since the sex organs were created the same way basically.

The sensation and pleasure of sex is therefore not the primary reason for sexual promiscuity. Nor is the ‘satisfaction’ one gets from sex.

I saw strange things that were hard to comprehend when I was working.

How does someone coming from his wife rush to look for a prostitute immediately they leave home?

Why does a man sneak back home to have sex with the house girl when his wife is at work, and vice versa, when they probably had sex with their partner the previous night?

That is simply the goat nature manifesting.

A goat does not enjoy eating at the point it is picking food. They swallow and swallow.

They enjoy that food three days later as they are chewing the cud. By then it will have fermented (I read that from biological experts)

They must sample to eat. They in fact eat by sampling. That is why they never get full. Show a goat something new and they will jump from their siesta however full they may appear to be. You will always see them feeding on the borders however lush the centre is.

You tether a goat and the end of the rope will be trampled bare yet it was tethered with the best pasture closest to the centre.

To a goat risk is motivation as they operate by the borderline theology.

Another thing I have noticed is that goats fear being alone. They feed looking around for the others.

The first goat we bought made so much noise we hardly slept. Then we brought others and the noise ceased.

Even when herding them, you will find that they do not scatter very far since they must be within sight of each other. A few bites and they look around to see where the others are. No wonder goats do not normally get lost.

But apart from need for company is another reason for the same.

A goat believes that the other goat has or is in a better pasture. No wonder they will be all over the place looking to snatch from each other.

This of course means that peer pressure is a huge item in a goat’s life. That is why my title is thus.

A goat cries for personal space yet will never settle without other goats.

Look at human nature.

Why do people buy all-terrain vehicles when living and working in well paved city roads?

Why does someone with only one child (or even none) and rarely having visitors buy or build a ten or more-bedroom mansion?

Why would someone who rarely walks have a wardrobe full of shoes that they may never wear?

Why would someone without any children continue building his wealth portfolio by grabbing from the vulnerable?

To most they are symbols of success – goatish nature.

We seek to compete and compare with each other. Or we are fighting to appear better than the other person.

Peer pressure thrives with goats.

We cry personal space yet are unable to handle it if it is not congregated with others.

We love the feel of achievement only when we can share with others and show them how much better we are than them or prove them wrong in their assessment of our achievement.

Why do we love huge churches yet we know that fellowship and ministry is minimal?

Why do we support pastors and churches with budgets in their millions yet we will run to that pastor of a small church when we need actual ministry?

We want to be associated with success and believe numbers and budgets are the yardstick for the same – goatish behaviour.

We love numbers and swim with numbers. We love good locations even when we cannot afford them.

That is why many people living in the slums bordering leafy suburbs like to say they live on those estates. And I saw that even in church when they were filling forms for this or the other.

A goat fears being alone.

That is why the prayer closet is a no for many believers since they then must face God on His terms.

That is why people shout in prayer as if God is deaf.

That is why people must be in a prayer centre or meeting to effectively pray.

There is nothing wrong with prayer meetings or prayer centres. But if that is the only place you can effectively pray, chances are that you are a goat.

If people must know you are praying, or even see you praying, it is also likely that you are a goat.

Or what did Christ say in Matthew 6?

Another thing I need to mention is that there is a whole spectrum of goatishness in goats.

Some goats are in behaviour close to sheep.

They are not overly scared of the shepherd. They do not scatter all over when released to pasture, they eat without jumping all over the pasture. They do not overly concern themselves with other goats once they get to the pasture. Etc.

Incidentally, they become the focal point for the other goats; more like automatic leaders. You see, the other goats equate their ‘rest’ with great pasture and so will hang around.

Confirms why a friend advised me to buy a sheep to make the goats eat better.

What am I driving at?

There are non-believers who behave like believers and can easily be mistaken for being sheep.

But their hearts are still goatish since their nature has not been transformed by the Gospel.

That is why the Gospel presentation is so important.

There are enough instances of even pastors getting saved when the Gospel is clearly explained. Yet they had all the time thought they were sheep because they behaved like sheep, even doing everything sheep did.

The clearer the Gospel is presented, the easier is it to separate sheep looking goats from actual sheep.

But I need to make another application

Why is it that single people prefer having sex with married people? Why do girls prefer older married men for a husband? What is so intriguing or special with having sex with a minister of the Gospel?

Goats respect sheep. They know that the settled nature of sheep is the security they need to eat well.

Left to itself, it is possible for a goat to sleep hungry since it will never settle anywhere.

That is why a youth will waste their youth and later join the church to get a sheep spouse. They will not trust their goat partners when they want to settle down in marriage.

In summary let me say this.

Peer pressure is the preserve of goats. Sheep are content with wherever the shepherd takes them and will settle down with the pasture they are led to without looking over their shoulders to see whether other sheep have a better pasture.

Rest is the preserve of sheep. Contentment defines a sheep under a shepherd.

A goat looks at and seeks to have what their neighbour has.

A sheep prays for daily bread. A goat prays for a better life, especially in comparison with someone else.

Motivation is the fare for goats since they must be pointed to a ‘higher’ purpose. Plain Biblical instruction is the fare for sheep since all they need to know is how to connect with the Shepherd’s voice.

Goats must be shown why it is important for them to give. Sheep give because they have a relationship with the Shepherd.

In the next post, I intend to lead us to the application of these truths to our pastoral mandate.

And why so? I know someone is wondering.

The church is composed of goats and transformed goats.

Do you realise that the same crowd that screamed, ‘crucify Him’ was the same one that was earlier seeking to make Him king by force?

Do you realise that Judas was with Jesus since the start of His public ministry?

Remember Jesus teaching about wheat and tares?

It is therefore important for the minister to be effective whether it is sheep or goats he is entrusted with, especially because goats always want to be close to sheep. And of course because his ministry should serve as a gateway for goats to be transformed into sheep.