The Willem

Like a Dog Returns to His Vomit

// February 2nd, 2010 // Prayer, Reflection, Strongholds

Two times, this phrase is penned in Scripture.

“Like a dog that returns to his vomit is a fool who repeats his folly”(Proverbs 26:11 ESV) is the first. The Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary comments: “11. returneth . folly-Though disgusting to others, the fool delights in his folly.”

“What the true proverb says has happened to them: ‘The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire.’”(2 Peter 2:22 ESV) is the second.

I couldn’t help but think of these references today as I returned from a visit to El Colli. Our favorite (I know, I know, we shouldn’t have favorites) family from the neighborhood is a mom (who babysits Seth during the week) and her six daughters, and she had just moved back into the neighborhood. You’d expect us to be excited to have her back, right? Wrong. She should have stayed three hours away in Aguascalientes with her parents, where we helped move her several months ago. This woman has run away from her drunk, abusive, deadbeat husband more times than she can actually remember, and she keeps crawling back. Why? Why does she do it?

“My daughters miss their dad” was the excuse she gave this time, as the two oldest girls rolled their eyes and shook their heads behind her back. The oldest is now 17, with a baby boy of her own and a deadbeat runaway boyfriend to match. The second oldest is 13 and has recently started to recognize and vocalize the ridiculous decisions her mother is making, but without any guidance is doing so destructively and disrespectfully. I glanced around the sparsely decorated one-room shack, smelling the dust mixed with the odor of an overfull outhouse, feeling the pocked and pitched, broken concrete beneath my feet, leaning upon the bunkbed which slept six girls and a baby boy, soaking in the chill of the open doorways and the symphony of torrential rain on the aluminum roof. My eyes wandered back to “Mom.” She was currently explaining how her husband was “actually changing this time.” How she “could hear it in his voice.” She rambled on about how “even though he’s said all of these things before,” she “knew he wouldn’t hit [her] anymore…certainly not in front of the girls.”

We had helped this sow remove herself from the mire (I don’t mean to call her a pig; I love this woman and think she has a heart of gold, but that’s the biblical example I’ve got to work with so I’ll use it.) and wash herself clean, giving her a new start in a new city free of her old problems. True to form, she then promptly returned to wallow, taking her litter with her. We feel so powerless to help her, because she won’t help herself. The true pain, though, lies with the girls. What are those girls learning about strength, about love, about role models, about respect? What will the impact be on their future relationships with guys?

There is so much work to be done here, and so much we are powerless to do. I am so thankful that we can rely on Christ Jesus to transform hearts, minds, and lives; to redeem the enslaved, to heal the broken, and to encourage and strengthen the weak. I’m praying for this family and this neighborhood, and I would be honored if you would join me in that prayer.