Whose Are You, Anyway?

If you’ve ever been around a feral dog, you know they aren’t pleasant creatures. They eat nasty stuff and roll in worse. They are filthy and unkempt, smell disgusting, and have a wild and sneaky look in their eye. God’s project with humans is a lot like man taming a wild dog. The dog may want a pleasant home and good food by the fire. The dog may emphatically not want to be scrubbed up, taught not to steal, and housebroken. The dog may not want to give up its wild and sneaky look for the docile and loving eye of a pet dog. But the dog in its wild state does not belong in a human house by the fire; it belongs in the woods or on the town dump. The dog in its tamed state will look more like Archie, my son’s collie puppy. Archie is in the process of becoming one of those well-trained dogs that are a joy to behold. And if you’ve seen a fully trained adult collie work, they can accomplish remarkable things that seem to be almost beyond doggy nature. (This analogy is partly borrowed from C.S. Lewis’s book The Problem of Pain.)

God wants to save us, but on his terms. We don’t get to stay wild, dirty, and smelly, though we often want to. God’s demand for holiness demands that we be scrubbed up, housebroken, and changed to an obedient nature. Our attitude in this painful process needs to be like Archie’s. Collies are very anxious to please their master and smart enough to try to figure out what their master wants. Once Archie figured out that his master really wanted him to pee outside, he made heroic efforts to comply. He sometimes chews on things he shouldn’t (my chair rung will never be the same), but he usually stops and repents when he’s told. He doesn’t like having baths or things pulled out of his mouth, but he cooperates. And when his master goes away, he objects with puppy sobs. Archie has faults, but he is growing up into a good, obedient dog.

Are we like Archie, with Jesus as the alpha in our pack? Are we anxious to please and trying to figure out what Jesus wants?

This is a sticking point for many people. In the legal and business world, the dog metaphor is also common. You’ll hear strong leaders referred to as the alpha, and their committed sidekicks as canines, feminine gender--without reference to the sidekicks’ actual gender. (Women also sometimes get referred to that way, but that is when people think they are either: a. acting like men, or b. acting obnoxious. The two are not the same thing.)

The point of our dog metaphor is to stress who can command loyalty. Sidekicks are supposed to “belong” to the alpha. Is it a problem to be either the alpha or the sidekick, canine, feminine gender? That depends on the purposes and motivations of the pack. Humans in groups often behave very badly, whether those groups are mobs, cliques, or legal professionals. C.S. Lewis describes such a scene in his novel, That Hideous Strength, where one of his protagonists makes a corrupt decision:

“But for him, it all slipped past in a chatter of laughter, of that intimate laughter between fellow professionals, which of all earthly powers is strongest to make men do very bad things before they are yet, individually, very bad men.”

In a profession that negotiates deep conflicts by means of advocacy, it’s easy for attorneys and their teams to find themselves in morally complicated situations. And it’s extraordinarily easy to slide into decisions that reflect the wild dog, especially if a leader is taking the pack the wrong direction. People may do something they wouldn’t do on their own and feel that it’s justified. Or at least that it’s unavoidable.

Jesus commented, “No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other.” (Matthew 6:24, ESV). Good decision-making in morally complicated situations requires reflection. Who is your pack leader? Who feeds you? Whose fire do you sit by? Are you growing into something remarkable, or reverting to a wild dog in the pack? In sum, “Whose are you, anyway?”