Building Fences or Digging Wells?

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Not too long ago, I was visiting my father, who lives on a small farm. One night about eleven-thirty, as we were getting ready for bed, there was a knock at the door. As the door was opened, the person before us skipped all cordial pleasantries and introductions and got straight to the point. She said, “I was just driving down the road and there was a bunch of cows walking down the middle of the road. I thought they might be yours and that you would want to know.” My dad kindly thanked her with a smiling face and an expression of gratitude.

We immediately proceeded to the back door, laced up our shoes, grabbed a couple of flashlights and jumped in his truck. We quickly located the cows. They had some how escaped from a pasture nearly a quarter of a mile away.  We managed to successfully get them back into the nearest pasture from where we found them. However, our task was not yet complete. “These cows got out of the pasture across that field,” my dad explained. “And, there’s more cows in that pasture. We need to go find out where and how they got out. They must have broken through the fence somewhere.”

After walking the fence line, we located their place of exit. They had crossed under a loose patch of fence through the bottom of a creek bed. We gathered some logs and large sticks and covered up the hole. It wasn’t sufficient, but was be good enough until we could come back and fix it properly in the morning daylight.

Who knows how long these cows had been loose or what motivated them to break free. Perhaps they really thought the grass was “greener on the other side,” as it were. Whatever the case, we located the hole in the fence and solved the problem, at least until the next time.

I’ve been in ministry for nearly twenty years. This is often how we address struggles, temptations and areas of sin, even Christianity in general. We build fences. “Don’t do this. Don’t go there.” I believe there is a biblical place for honest and transparent relationships. There are times for godly boundaries to be established to serve as a roadblock to unhealthy patterns of behavior. However, in the long run, fences, at least fences alone, may not be the best solution.

In fact, in more rural areas like the outback of Australia, where the farms or ranches cover an enormous geographical area, fencing the entire property simply isn’t feasible. Building fences in such vast and arid places would prove to be a never-ending task. The Australian ranchers have discovered a more effective way to prevent the cows from wandering off. Rather than building a fence, they dig a well right in the middle of the ranch. A well that can provide an abundant supply of clean drinking water. While the livestock may still be prone to wander, they rarely, if ever roam too far from the well. As long as there is clean water, the livestock will remain close by.

• Why to people wander away from God?
• Why does a husband or wife stray beyond the fences of holy matrimony into the pasture of another person’s spouse?
• How can one so easily become ensnared in some sin-woven life-destructive mind-set or pattern of behavior?

More often than not, in each of these situations, it’s not a fence problem, but a well problem. At some point, there ceased to be a well at the center of the relationship. When we cease to dig a well and drink from the water there of, we will wander to some other source of nourishment. This is true with our relationship with God, our spouse, our children, etc.

• So, what does it look like for you to dig a well?
• How can you dig a well in your relationship with God?
• What are some practical ways that you can ensure that there is “clean water,” as it were, flowing in your marriage and family?
• What are some signs that your well has slowly been filled in with dirt and is in need of some re-digging?

Drink water from your own cistern and fresh water from your own well. 
-Proverbs 5:15

“Whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. 

Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” -John 4:14