The Parable of the Cactus

Just wanted to share a little experience from Saturday with everyone because it is a really good lesson for us to remember, and it was learned the hard way.

Saturday was spring cleaning day at the Nethercott household. We had everything torn up, wet, outside, and we worked all day. It was cool but sunny so the little kids were outside most of the day in the sunshine somewhere in the yard as all this was happening. My mother in law who lives about 3 houses down from us saw our mess and came down to see if Sadie wanted to come play at her house so we wouldn't have to worry about her getting into trouble and finish up sooner. She had good intentions, however, she is fairly elderly (almost 90) but since Sadie is at a pretty easy stage we sent her down to their house just til we got things put back together. Unfortunately, about 15 minutes later my father in law called to say that Sadie had a little problem and was crying so she needed to come home to mom. Uh oh... my biggest fear is that she has gotten into medications and thought they were mints or something. It turns out the problem was "just" a cactus.

When my mother in law walked her down to her house she put Sadie in their yard and said to her "Sadie, you stay here and I am going to go next door for just a second to water my neighbors plant". Then she went over and watered the plant, turned around and there was Sadie, in the neighbors yard with her and covered with cactus spikes, crying of course. The neighbor had cactus plants in pots, pretty pots, and Sadie decided not to listen to grandma and stay where she was supposed to. I'm sure she didn't see any danger in ignoring grandma and heading over there to check out those interesting plants. The cactus looked soft and fuzzy but when she touched it thousands of little hair-like spikes stuck into her hand. She wiped her hands on her belly to get them off and they stuck into her belly as well. Poor girl.

After hours of tweezing, trying to get them out of her skin with tape, and soaking her in the bathtub, we got her calmed down. Then the lesson in all of this occurred to me. When we aren't obedient because WE may not see the harm in doing what we want, we learn the hard way. I think that sometimes we all think we know better than someone older and wiser who loves us, but often times we learn that there is harm where we thought there was none. And let me add that those spikes were painful, I got some in my hands just from pulling them out of her. Even after they are out, you still feel them. I think that is also how repentance works, the damage we did gets undone, but we still feel the pain for a long time after. This way maybe next time we are told or commanded not to do something, we will remember the pain from the time we disobeyed.