“Moreover, I will make your battlements of rubies, And your
gates of crystal, And your entire wall of precious stones. All your sons will
be taught of the LORD; And the well-being of your
sons will be great.” (Isaiah 54:12-13 NAU)
The Great Wall of China has successfully protected her
from not only her enemies but from outside cultures for literally centuries.
Not until the globalization of transportation and communication of the
twenty-first century has China begun to interact with the rest of the world.
Walls have worked quite successfully for China. Some would say they have worked
too well. They have kept China deeply merged in a culture which is distinct
from the rest of the world. Only in recent years has she begun to emerge from
this isolation.
Since I grew up on the farm, many of my
illustrations come from observing life as it unfolds there. Fences, on the
farm, are just as much for keeping the cattle or chickens in as they for
keeping the predators out. The reality is that there is far more danger of the
animals becoming injured or lost by leaving the pasture than there is of
something coming into the pasture to harm them.
God’s walls or hedges,
as Job called them, are as much for keeping us in as they are for keeping
others out. We, like sheep and cattle, are prone to wandering, straying away
from the flock. When we do, we often get in trouble. I could tell many stories
of farm animals who decided to explore the world outside the pasture. Many of
those stories end in tragedy for the animal.
It certainly is no different for us. When we
choose to stray outside god’s boundaries for our lives, we pay dearly for our
rebellion. We need those walls and fences to keep us where God wants us and to
keep the enemies from destroying us.
Moreover, why
do we think, as fellow sheep in the Great Shepherd’s flock, it is none of our
concern when we see a wolf coming after one of the flock? We are prone to take
the attitude of Cain, in Genesis. “Am I my brother’s keeper?” The short answer
is “yes”—at the very least to the extent of caring enough to alert the Shepherd
of the danger we see.
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