When I was in high school, I complained to my parents that they “never let me do what the other kids did.” I wanted to wear shorter skirts, go to the movies, and attend school dances, all of which were prohibited. Dad’s retort was always the same. “Just because the other kids do it doesn’t make it right for you. If they all jumped off a cliff, would you jump too?”
Probably.
What I wanted more than anything was to fit in, and usually that translated to doing what everyone else was doing. I was following the “herd mentality” of the day; if it was good for my friends, it was good for me. It would be many years before I began thinking for myself.
Last weekend I visited a large farm in Iowa (yesterday’s blog) that was established in 1868 by my friend Fred’s great-grandfather. He began with 400 acres and a few head of cattle, but those 19th century animals probably acted exactly the same as the 21st century cattle I saw last weekend, despite the many generations between them. One of the things endemic to all of these animals is their “herd mentality.”
For example, Fred and Becky explained how cattle are quickly trained to steer clear of electric wire fencing. When one animal gets shocked and moves away, the others quickly follow. After that, workers can reshape the herd (to clean the feedlots or for any other reason), simply by stringing a wire anywhere across the pen. What one does, they all do.
The cattle also follow each other up a chute and into the truck that will take them to market, none the wiser. They aren’t able to think for themselves and just do what the animal in front of them does.
But cattle aren’t the only ones who abide by a herd mentality. The argument “everybody’s doing it” can apply to more than just cattle and high schoolers. For the rest of us it might mean cutting corners on taxes, falsely padding a resume’, not telling the whole truth, or any number of other things… because “everybody’s doing it.” But God challenges us to make up our minds, each one of us, as to the standards we keep.
Scripture paints an interesting word picture about a “narrow gate” being the way into God’s kingdom. It also describes the way most of the “herd” will go, calling it “the wide gate” with a broad road leading up to it. In other words, the narrow way is the difficult way, and the wide way is easy. So we need to be careful about which crowd we’re following, or we might find ourselves in some big trouble.
As for the cattle? They can follow the herd mentality all they want.
“You can enter God’s Kingdom only through the narrow gate. The highway to hell is broad, and its gate is wide for the many who choose that way.” (Matthew 7:13)