Goatee, the Grass-eating Goat, and Its Owner

An illustration of what real change looks like for the Christian

Image by Christel SAGNIEZ from Pixabay

Let us meet Goatee

There once was a goat, called Goatee, who loved to eat grass, as all goats do. Unfortunately, Goatee's owner, who had a luscious garden, understandably,  did not share Goatee's passion for eating grass.

Goatee's quick thinking thwarted every attempt by its owner to ward it off his garden. For instance, when Goatee's owner built a hedge around the garden, Goatee ate its way through, and when he made a fence around it, Goatee head-butted its way in. Not knowing what else to do, Goatee's owner decided it needed counselling.

Goatee goes for counselling.

So off to counselling, they went. The trained counsellor, a psychologist of repute, tried to get Goatee to think of other things besides its owner's luscious garden. The counsellor told Goatee to recite, "My owner's garden is not food, but a work of art" at least a thousand times daily.

Following counselling, the owner had a respite from defending his garden until the day his neighbours came to his home with batons demanding that he surrender Goatee. It was then he realised that even though Goatee had let his garden be, it had gone to his neighbours' gardens instead. So, they returned to counselling. The counsellor, who was a Christian, then suggested that Goatee be taken to church for deliverance and become born again.

Goatee goes to church.

So, off to church, they went—Goatee and its owner. In church, before the service began, Goatee's owner told the pastor the difficulty he was having with Goatee. The pastor excitedly said that his sermon that morning incidentally was to be about change and advised Goatee to listen attentively and do whatever ministered to it. At this point, Goatee was getting stressed with everyone knowing his business and issues with grass. So, Goatee made up its mind to give this a try also.

During the service, the sermon, titled "Changing your way of life", stressed the fact that our actions affect other people and that unless we change our behaviour, we would soon find ourselves in big trouble, if not becoming isolated from everyone else. The pastor concluded by announcing that such a change is possible when we become born again through repentance.

The pastor then gave an "altar call"—an invitation to those who want to repent and be born again to come forward. Goatee's owner nudged Goatee forward. Goatee went to the altar and said the "sinner's prayer"—a prayer of confession of wrong done and acceptance of Jesus into its life—all the while wondering how grass-eating was sinful. Afterwards, the pastor gleefully told Goatee that it was now born again and a new creature. It was a day of joy and relief for both Goatee and its owner.

Goatee is born again!

Happily, they went home, announced to the neighbours that their gardens were now safe because "Goatee is now born again!" Goatee and its owner were now regulars at church services, and many of the neighbours who were not attending church services began going for church meetings. Goatee was no longer seen as a threat or an enemy and had free access to everyone's compound. Initially, the neighbours were apprehensive, but after a while, they felt safe, especially seeing that Goatee had become a worker in the church and had the most wonderful baritone in the church choir.

The unravelling of Goatee

One day, one of the neighbours found a massive patch in his garden. Not wanting to believe Goatee's culpability and raise unwarranted suspicion nor offend Goatee's owner, she kept quiet about it. Unknown to her, other neighbours had had the same experience.

When the matter came to light, everyone was disappointed in Goatee, including the pastor and Goatee's choir colleagues. Goatee never really changed; it merely used its church attendance as a garb to ward off suspicion. The shame was too much to bear, so Goatee's owner sold off his property and together with Goatee, they relocated to another part of the world.

So what went wrong with Goatee?

Why was Goatee unable to stop its ‘bad habit’? What really could have been done to help Goatee? These were questions that bothered the pastor. As he pondered these things, God said to him, "Answering an "altar call", saying the "sinner's prayer", being an active participant in church activities and even joining the church workforce or singing in the choir does not mean that a person has changed."

The Lord told him that bringing an individual to Christ through repentance was only the beginning of the journey. "That individual must go through changes in their lives by the Holy Spirit's working in them through the preaching and teaching of God's word." The Lord continued, "Being born again allows the Holy Spirit access into an individual's life so that meaningful change can take place. This change is radical; it changes everything about the personality since it changes the very essence of the person—their nature!"

The Lord explained further, "The natural man cannot but sin because of the sin-loving nature of all human beings, just as Goatee could not help eating grass! No matter the quantum of preaching, you cannot get the natural man to love God. Outwardly, they seem to love God, but they cannot obey Him. They struggle and cannot overcome sin. Even when they hate what they are doing, they cannot help themselves. Thus, the work of the Holy Spirit is first to change the nature of people from sin-loving to God-loving."

Then the pastor understood what the Lord meant when He told His disciples,

"Those who love me will do what I say." (John 14:23, GW)

He also realised that he had been trying to change people by merely preaching and thinking that those who told him that his sermons were great would change!

Launderers and their detergent

Beloved, like Goatee in our fictitious story, we cannot stop our wrong behaviour by merely being born again, attending church meetings, and even becoming workers and ministers in the church. You need a combination of the Holy Spirit and God's word to change your sin-loving nature.

It is like a launderer and detergent. No matter how strong the launderer is, without detergent, the clothes would be bruised, damaged, and unclean still. On the other hand, merely soaking clothes in the detergent does not make clothes clean, and the longer clothes remain soaked in detergent-solution, the worse they become. The washing action of the launderer is required to remove stains and give the clothes a clean sparkle. The Holy Spirit—the Launderer—without God's word—detergent—is a misnomer, and God's word without the Holy Spirit is abnormal! Through God's Word, the Holy Spirit works to bring about permanent positive change in an individual who is born again.

Merely desiring change is not enough to cause a change!

Many of us would love to see changes in our lives and the lives of others, but merely desiring change does not translate to a change. The desire for change is good, but why do you want it?

Goatee desired change because of the misery it was bringing to its owner and the associated stress. Goatee's owner and their neighbours wanted Goatee to change to safeguard their gardens. The pastor desired change for Goatee because it increased church attendance.

The hypocrisy of modern Christianity

The moment Goatee's behaviour no longer grieved people around it, Goatee relapsed but learnt to cover up its wrong acts! Today, many hypocrites shuffle in and out of church buildings and meetings. These ‘Christians’ have perfected the art of covering up their sins.

They even justify the sins of others. They would not confess their sins before God nor seek His help. Unfortunately, we may justify our sins before men, but not before God, who sees and knows the intent of all men!

Changing our nature

God desires to change our sin-loving human nature to a God-loving divine nature. Getting us there is a process that is aptly captured in 2 Peter 1.

His [God's] divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue, by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For he who lacks these things is shortsighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins. Therefore, brethren, be even more diligent to make your call and election sure, for if you do these things you will never stumble (2 Peter 1:3-10, NKJV)

Being born again is like being born into a home. Yes, you are now a member of the family. Still, you will be nurtured to maturity and become a responsible family member, exhibiting the family’s nature or traits.

To exhibit the nature of God, the Scripture passage above tells us that we must grow from faith at salvation to displaying moral excellence or integrity, that is, living right by God's standard. Then we must learn more about God, not just for knowledge's sake, but to know Him intimately and then allow Him to control us—self-control. No one can control himself/herself, but we can yield to the Holy Spirit's control. The Holy Spirit's control then leads to perseverance which is the trait of enduring things that are unpalatable to human nature, like hardship, a desire for vengeance, inability to wait for something to happen in its time, suffering deprivation without resentment, etc.

Perseverance then manifests in godliness—living a godly life—; a God-pleasing life. Godliness manifests in brotherly kindness, which then culminates in love for all human beings, regardless of skin colour, nationality, tribe, ethnicity, economic status, political affiliation, religious beliefs, etc. Such a growth process does not breed hypocrisy but makes us understand the achievable goal set before us. Not growing this way is a sure sign that we are stunted in our Christian development. Indeed, Peter described this as shortsightedness, if not blindness, regarding the change that occurred at salvation. Such people relapse or backslide to the old lifestyle.

Goatee's relapse manifests as our hypocritical lifestyle

Today, we read about renowned ‘Christian leaders’ worldwide who lived or are living hypocritical lifestyles. These ‘Christian leaders’ have mastered living a double life; it is natural to them. Far worse is the impact of their hypocritical lifestyle on other Christians, especially those most influenced by their teachings.

And herein is another protection which God has given us: He does not want us to venerate servants of God but His word, which is unfailing! Human beings may fail or fall, but God's word neither fails nor falls—you can trust it!

God's desire is "No more relapse!"

God's desire has always been that all who come to Him will eternally be with Him. To achieve this, He takes responsibility for changing our nature from a sin-loving one to a God-loving one. In the state of a God-loving nature, we effortlessly live for God and avoid and repudiate sin. And this, beloved, is what a changed life is all about!

One caveat is that you must be willing to make yourself available to God to make the changes!

Shalom!