The Unbiblical Cord

Mustard Seed Chronicles: Story Time with LU Grandma

Years ago, we traveled to visit my twin sister and her family in Ohio. Her children and our boys were quite young then. Up the road from my sister’s home was a family who had goats. One of the goats was scheduled to give birth before the family went away on a trip. However, the momma goat had not by the time the family wanted to leave, so they enlisted my brother-in-law to check on her. A couple of days after they left, my six-year-old niece came into the house in a rush and said, “Come quick! Come quick the baby has been born!”

Some of her urgency was remembering the family’s instructions about baby goats being born: if the baby wasn’t standing up after it was born, then we had to make it stand up or it would die. To the house, we ran with her.

My little niece picked up the baby goat and touched the umbilical cord. She said, “Oh no! I touched the unbiblical cord! We have to cut the unbiblical cord!”

That’s right, she said unbiblical cord! After a good laugh, we helped the goat to stand, cut the umbilical cord, and got him with his mom. All was well.

As much as this makes for a good family story, one that makes us chuckle even all these years later, it is also a profound one. I was reminded of a deeper meaning to our unbiblical connection as I watched a mother squirrel on a tree in our yard this past spring. I saw there were three babies she had birthed in the knot hole of that tree! I had never seen that before – three baby squirrels at once. But the squirrel’s babies are what brought the “unbiblical” story back to mind.

God spoke to my heart, as He often does through His Spirit, and said, “When you are ‘born again’ in salvation, you are to cut your unbiblical cord, too. All the old worldly stuff you hold as yours: bad habits, anger, bitterness, pride, a judgmental spirit, and arrogance; all must go. Those things you used to do not belong in your new life with me. As it says in 2 Corinthians 5:17, ‘Therefore, if anyone [is] in Christ, [he is] a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new’ (NKJV).

As the Lord revealed this to me, I pray it is an encouragement to you also. Let us make this the best “out with the old, in with the new” year of our lives!

Prayer

Dear Heavenly Father, as Christ followers You desire to give us all a new kind of life full of blessings with a new purpose. May we live in a whole new way with our focus on Your Word, the Bible. I know when I started my new life there were some old ways of thinking I had to throw out so You could give me new meaning, ministry to my family and others. I want that for our LU family too. Please make that happen for them as You did for me.

I pray this in the precious name of Jesus.

Amen!