“Lasting spiritual results are destroyed by failing to
deal with the weights and sins that so easily dog our feet”. (Heb. 12: 1)
As women we are bent on counting the cost, whatever that entails and we make all kinds of sacrifices for the benefit and success of our family. We have our eye on the prize and nurture our spiritual opportunities as they present themselves daily, looking ahead for the promise of lasting spiritual results. Part of the “cost” is dealing with what… so easily “besets” us! “The tragic destruction of these “weights and sins” is vividly illustrated in the life of the zebra. He is stalked by brutal packs of cape hunting dogs. One cape dog is not large enough or strong enough to bring down a zebra, hence the need to run in packs of twelve to twenty.
The hunt begins with each pack member following the lead dog in single file. They move slowly at first, but as their victim is separated from the rest of the herd, the dogs begin to pick up speed. A pack of cape dogs can maintain a steady pace of up to thirty miles an hour!
As the lead dog catches up to its tiring prey, it locks its jaws into any flesh it can reach and tenaciously hangs on. The clinging predator slows down the zebra and further weakens him. Other dogs soon catch up and find vulnerable spots on which to clamp their jaws. Eventually the whole pack converges on the struggling zebra and pulls him to the ground.
The cape dogs begin to feed immediately, often before the zebra is dead. Once down, a complete zebra may be devoured by a pack of cap dogs in less than thirty minutes!” Bill Gothard
As women, we are faced with the “Cape Dogs” in our lives. Feelings of inferiority, guilt for past failures, bitterness and anger for past hurt or pain, rationalized addictive habits, a sense of lack of purpose and direction in life…etc. Are there things in the past that you wish had never happened or you could change and every time you remember them, they bring guilt and shame? How many battlefields are you fighting in your moral life: impure thoughts, questionable actions or an enslaving habit? Have you been deeply hurt by others and you cannot forgive them? Can you answer life’s three BIG questions (Where did I come from? Why am I here? And… Where am I going?) …
The race is on with the cape dogs of temptation and sin weakening us, as they nip at our feet! The challenge is to clear our conscience continually and maintain our “walk” with Him so the mouth-watering cape dogs, don’t have an opportunity to capture and destroy us and our heritage. Children, and husbands, are eagerly counting on us to keep pace and deal with anything that would easily hinder and defeat us by our “failing to take care of the weights and sin that dog us” so routinely.
Let’s learn from the ensnared Zebra and the tenacious Cape Dogs…
~Jackie Johnson - I am a former tribal missionary to the Kuna Indians on the Colombian border in Central America. Fluent in several languages, my husband and I currently pastor a Spanish-speaking church in Southern California. My passion is mentoring and equipping dedicated young women for life, marriage, motherhood, and beyond. I am the mother of two daughters and the grandmother of three Princesses and four young Knights.
