Why Do We Keep Getting Stuck in the Fence?

Every day this week I have gone out into the heat of summer to get a goat from being stuck in the fence—sometimes several times a day.

I have to go outside multiple times a day and listen for a cry to ensure none of our goats are in distress and need help. If they get their heads stuck in the fence in this horrible June heat and are left there too long, they can get severely dehydrated. Being stuck with wires around your throat unable to move is distressing.

The thing about goats—they are always getting stuck in fences.

Their horns can either be used for good to protect them, or to their detriment—to trap them. (When you think about it, depending on how you use your strength makes a difference in the outcome.) This is what happens when we use our strength to wrestle against God—not trusting that the pasture He has provided for us has all we need to sustain us—and instead try to stick our neck into places it doesn't belong or move ahead of the Good Shepherd to a pasture He has not prepared for us to enter.

There is purpose in where God has placed us.

At some point we have to ask ourselves:
Why do we keep getting stuck in the fence?

A lot of times, it’s the same goat—the one who has yet to learn from their folly.

“Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help…
But do not look to the Holy One of Israel,
or seek help from the Lord.”

— Isaiah 31:1

Sometimes I find one stuck right between two pastures. And it struck me—this is what it means to be lukewarm. Still stuck in the middle. Not fully committed. Not fully gone. Just stuck. And the thing about being stuck is—you’ve cut off your ability to get to Living Water.

You can’t reach the water trough.
You can’t graze freely.
You’re just stuck, and all you have left is a cry for help.

And you need a Good Shepherd to come and rescue you.

I’ve stood there and watched goats trying to get themselves unstuck. But their horns have them trapped. The very area of their strength and strong will is the very thing used to trap them in the fence wires. I’ve watched them wrestle and fight to get free. But they can’t get out. Not without help.

Sometimes, it’s so bad, we have to get wire cutters to cut them out.

And our Good Shepherd Jesus—He has His wire cutter too:
A rod of correction, the Shepherd’s Staff.

If a goat stays too long, their cry becomes faint. Sometimes, they become too weak to even call out. That’s why we count the goats at the end of every day. And when we notice one is missing—we go in search of it.

We do not stop looking until it is found.

This is Jesus.

“If a man has a hundred sheep, and one of them goes astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine and go to the mountains to seek the one that is straying?”

— Matthew 18:12

He leaves the ninety-nine to come searching for the one.

Shepherding stubborn goats for a living has taught me a lot about longsuffering, endurance, and compassion—the unrelenting, never-giving-up love of a Shepherd who sees the value attached to every member of the flock.

How easily we get stuck in the fence.

And this is not just for those in sin—but those stuck in a place of doubt and unbelief, worry, fear, confusion, depression, isolation, etc.

This is not where our Good Shepherd wants us to be.
It’s not safe there.
We could die stuck in that fence.

He wants us in green pastures, grazing on the goodness He has labored to provide—in soil He has tenderly prepared that produces the choice “grass” of His Living Word, fenced in and protected on all sides, with large troughs of water that never run dry.

Ultimately, this entire world is the fence—and all that is beyond it.
But the Good Shepherd has placed us in the sheepfold of His kingdom to remain there while grazing through this world.

So I’ll leave you with this…
Stay in the pasture where the Lord has placed you—until He opens a fence and LEADS you to another pasture.

“He makes me to lie down in green pastures;
He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul…”

— Psalm 23:2–3

Misti Rains Kantor

Meet our goats & watch more farm stories →

Newer reflection: It Knows the Sound of Its Source

Earlier reflection: Be the White Dog