Dr. Ed Young - Fainting Goats

To what can we compare this generation? With that question in mind, I encountered something I had never heard of before. There’s a special category of goats called fainting goats. Did you know that? By the way, these goats have the finest cashmere of any goat. Cashmere, as you may know, comes only from goats. How many of you knew that? Don’t lie in church! How many already knew that cashmere comes from goats? I didn’t know that at all. However, these fainting goats have the highest quality of cashmere, which is not fur; it’s hair. They harvest that hair from these goats, and cashmere is three times warmer than sheep’s wool. It should be noted that the word wool doesn’t necessarily mean it comes from sheep; it simply refers to the matted part that they take off of certain animals, distinct from hair and skin, etc.

So, these fainting goats are unusual animals. You cannot herd them; they just won’t herd at all. When a wolf or a shepherd approaches, they don’t recognize the difference-they just go stiff and faint. Bam! They go down stiff! That’s just how they operate. If a shepherd tries to remove a parasite off one of them, they are frightened and fall down. You can’t lead them; they don’t know the difference between that action and being lost. They are indeed very unusual animals, and therefore, they are almost extinct. They keep a few of them and put them into herds of normal goats. They use them this way: when wolves come, all the normal goats run away, but the fainting goats just collapse. That’s what the wolves feast on. It protects the other goats; they become a meal for the wolves so that the wolves will be satisfied and not pursue the rest.

The rest of the goats produce cashmere, but not nearly as valuable as that which you find on this particular breed. I thought about that, I knew this story, and I pondered the question: to what can we compare this generation? I think a pretty good comparison would be fainting goats. We are a lot like those fainting goats. I want you to see this biblically. Jesus here would say to us that fainting goats-that’s you and I; that’s our generation. They do not repent. Listen carefully. With that in mind, turn in your scripture to Matthew, chapter 11, beginning with verse 20. Then He, Jesus, began to denounce the cities in which most of His miracles were done because they did not repent. There’s our word. Remember, fainting goats do not repent. Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the miracles had occurred in Tyre and Sidon that occurred in you, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.

Verse 22: Nevertheless, I say to you, it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment than for you. What is Jesus saying? Stay with me! Our question is: What can we compare this generation to? I think the fainting goats are a fitting metaphor. They do not repent, which means to change, to turn around, to go in a different direction, to see the danger that is coming and respond to it. They just flop! That’s the way a lot of us are, ladies and gentlemen. When confronted with truth, with a new life, with changes, we say, «You know, I’m just going to stay in this SOS-same old stuff.» The status quo is good enough for me, and we refuse to repent-we refuse to change.

Jesus is saying that this is what happened to the two cities, Chorazin and Bethsaida. He said, «I performed miracles. You’ve seen the blind gain their sight. You’ve seen those who were dead brought back to life.» These cities are very close to the Mount of Beatitudes; they would have heard the Sermon on the Mount. They had watched Him and observed what He did and what He said.

Now notice something about Jesus. Much about our Lord is unique, but there’s uniqueness here in that what He said and what He taught is what He lived up to. Find another major religious leader in one of the major religions of the world, and you’ll see it doesn’t happen. He lived based on what He taught. Here are these two cities where He spent time teaching, leading, and performing supernatural signs. A miracle in the Bible is a sign; it points you in the right direction when you are going in the wrong direction. That’s where the word repent originates-» I was going this way, but I repent and do an about-face. I go the opposite way.» That is repentance. He said, «You didn’t repent.»

Jesus said, «If I had spent as much time in Tyre and Sidon- these were two Phoenician cities, pagan cities, godless cities, inhabited by corrupt people — if they had seen the miracles I performed and if they had heard the teaching that you have heard, they would have repented and would still be on God’s side.» But He said, «You’ve heard, and you did not repent. Therefore, your judgment is going to be more severe than that of those who were pagans.» By the way, there will be a time of judgment. Everybody says, «We like justice.» In order for justice to take place in eternity, there has to be judgment. Jesus says those godless cities will be in better shape than you, who have had so much light, and you continue to walk in darkness. That scares me. It really scares me, and it should scare all of us.

So, what do we compare this generation to? Fainting goats that do not repent. Also, something else He talks about is another town: Capernaum. Capernaum was Jesus' headquarters. He goes on in the next verses, saying, «All the light that I have given to Capernaum, the miracles you’ve seen there-everything that has happened there — look, Capernaum, you are going to be judged more severely because you have continued to be a fainting goat.» We might say, «Stay right where you are. Oh, what miracle can you do for me today?» He states that there will be severe judgment on Capernaum, worse than on Sodom, the most godly city in existence. Jesus said that Sodom wouldn’t have been under the Judgment of God had they heard the light and the truth that you have heard.

So we see the importance of repentance. We cannot get to the point that we are so complacent and indifferent that we continue to walk in darkness when Christ has said, «I’ve given you all this truth; you can walk in light.» Fainting goats just stiffen up and stay where they are. They didn’t do anything bad; there’s no indictment of any particular sin-they just didn’t do anything. They just bam! Fainting goats refuse to repent.

Also, we see that Jesus says fainting goats, if that’s the symbol-if that’s the metaphor we’re using for our generation- they do not respond to revelation. What is revelation? It is truth. Look at verse 25, chapter 11 of Matthew. At that time Jesus said, «I praise You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants. Yes, Father, for this way was well pleasing in Your sight.» What is He saying? In this prayer, He is stating that this is the Father’s way to speak to people. This is the way of truth.

Let me tell you, a lot of people come to a point where they say, «I want God to do this,» or «Why did God do that?» They don’t understand His workings or the uniqueness of His salvation plan. «I’m the way and the truth and the life.» That sounds too exclusive for me; it’s not inclusive enough for me! Listen, go back to Isaiah 55-great verse! You ought to have it marked in your Bible. I’ll paraphrase it: «As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts higher than your thoughts.» What is He saying? He is saying God is in control, ladies and gentlemen; He is sovereign. And I’ll tell you a secret: He knows exactly what He’s doing. He knows exactly what He’s doing.

So, revelation comes, and He speaks to that revelation. Look what He says in verse 27: «All these things have been handed over to Me» — Jesus, speaking-"by the Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son wills to reveal Him.» He’s saying this is the Father’s method of operation; this is the Son’s method of operation. If you know Jesus, you know the Father; if you know the Father, you know Jesus. He’s saying here’s the revelation I’ve given to you, and still they are fainting goats. Bam! They do not repent.

What’s it going to take, Jesus says, to wake you up and move you out? God must say this about you and me all the time. You think, «What is it going to take to get through to Edwin? What is it going to take to get through to Bill, to Alice, to Mary? What is it going to take for them to repent and to change? For them truly to understand the truth that I’m giving them?» Gandhi, about a week or so before he died, had a friend visit him who knew Gandhi had been searching for God all his life. He asked, «Have you found Him?» Gandhi said, «No, I’m still searching.»

Gandhi was a God-fearing man, a great leader in the world, a pacifist who led India out of the bondage of foreign domination. But Gandhi spent his whole life searching. Ladies and gentlemen, let me tell you the difference between philosophy and theology. The philosopher is always looking for God: «I want to find God. I want to find the sum total of life. I want to find ultimate meaning.» The Bible teaches us that’s not the way it is; God is always looking for you and me. God is searching us out. We just have to understand His presence, respond to the light that we have, and repent of the things in darkness.

If we do not, we are fainting goats. You know what happens to fainting goats? If this is a good symbol of our generation, this is a great tragedy. Flip over to the passage on the unpardonable sin. Whoa! The sin that will never be forgiven! People ask me periodically, «I think I’ve committed the unpardonable sin.» My open answer is: One thing for sure, you haven’t if you’re asking me that question.

Look at what the unpardonable sin is. It’s in Matthew 12, verses 30 and following. Jesus is talking: «He who is not with Me is against Me, and he who does not gather with Me scatters.» In other words, if we just fall down and say, «I’m going to stay here until lightning strikes,» He will say, «Oh, you are against me.» Therefore, I say to you, any sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven people; but blasphemy against the Holy Spirit — speaking against the Holy Spirit-shall not be forgiven.»

Verse 32: «For whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man- that’s Jesus — shall be forgiven him. But whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, either in this age or in the age to come.» This is the unpardonable sin. It is when the Holy Spirit works in your heart and life, trying to convict you and convince you and to bring you out into the light, and you still conduct yourself like fainting goats. We don’t repent. The truth comes, but we don’t repent until finally it gets to the point where our hearts are so hardened, our lives are so cold.

Go to Romans chapter 1; there’s a whole list of sin. Finally, Paul writes in Romans that God gave them up; God gave them over. Their hearts were so hardened that they had a reprobate mind. There was no fertile ground by which the Holy Spirit could convict and speak truth into their lives. That’s when we commit the unpardonable sin. We no longer turn to Christ, we no longer seek forgiveness; we’re just satisfied with «I, me, my, mine; my way, my idea, my insight.» We become increasingly narcissistic and increasingly out of coherence with life. All of a sudden, the spirit of God convicts us and deals with us, but we don’t feel it-we don’t understand it. Our hearts are hardened, and we’re lost. There’s no forgiveness in time or eternity; it’s over.

We are permanently a goat. When the Judgment comes and the sheep and goats are divided, we end up a goat. But there are words of magnificent hope in verses 28, 29, and 30 of chapter 11. It says a fainting goat can be rescued. What happens to us? We’re in darkness. When the lights go out, there’s no hope for us.

In the Second World War, in the North Atlantic, there was a vicious sea battle. A lot of enemy ships and planes were involved, and our ships were there as well. Finally, on one carrier, six airplanes took off to participate in the battle in the sky and the battle between destroyers and other vessels in the area. Suddenly, conditions got so severe that the carrier turned all the lights off. The planes circling couldn’t see the land. They requested, «Just flash the light and give us a chance to land.» The response was, «We can’t take the risk because there are thousands of people on board and many other planes; we can’t take that risk.»

So, those six planes just flew out there until they ran out of fuel and went down into the sea. All lives were lost in order to save thousands of lives on the carrier. Listen, when God turns out the light, when you turn out the light, and when there’s no basis for Him to touch your heart, we reject the Holy Spirit, His conviction, His leadership-that is the unpardonable sin.

But there is a rescue plan for all of this generation of fainting goats. What is it? Look at those verses I pointed out. The first one begins with the word «Come.» It’s an invitation: «Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden.» Is anybody here laboring with life? Is anybody here heavy laden with life? Is the weight so heavy and strong that you say, «Lord, I want to come to Christ. I come in desperation»? «All ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.» He gives us rest when we come to Him.

By the way, this rest is peace with God. We get right with God on the terms of Christ, and we have peace with God. It’s fabulous to know I’m not perfect; I’ve got a lot of warts, but man, I’ve got God’s peace. He says, «Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.» That’s peace with God. Then He says a second stanza that goes even deeper: «Take My yoke upon you.» The yoke of God is just designed for you and me. You know what a yoke is? It was that wooden apparatus they would make and put around the head of an ox, teaming it with another ox, so they could pull heavy weights together.

Jesus says, «Come and get yoked up with Me. Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me.» We go to school with Him. It’s always scary to ask someone to mentor you or to go and tell someone to teach you how to do something because they’ll discover we’re not as smart as they thought we were. We might be afraid that, as we get under one of these teachers, they will expose us. But Jesus says, «Come; take My yoke upon you and learn of Me.» And then He says, «I am gentle and humble.» Isn’t it great to have a teacher who is gentle and humble, who won’t embarrass or expose all of our flaws? He says, «Come, take, learn, and then you will have rest in your soul.»

We’ve already got the rest, which means we’re right with God. Now we have rest in our soul, meaning we now have the rest of God, the peace of God. People, do we need that? Oh, we need that-the peace with God and the peace of God. And that’s the appeal; that’s the invitation. And then there’s that last little verse which I really love: «For My yoke is easy, and My burden is light.» In the Greek, that means «My yoke is well-fitting.»

When we get yoked up with Jesus Christ, let me tell you, His yoke fits us perfectly. When I’m doing something that I really enjoy, I can sweat and work in the sun and have a great time. When I’m doing something I don’t want to do, like pulling up weeds in the flower bed under the same sun, I am miserable. Why? This task fits me, while that one doesn’t. Listen, coming to Christ is not an overbearing thing; His yoke fits perfectly. It’s exclusively tailored and designed to meet your life, your need, your needs, so you can thrive in this world and have a life that really counts.

You might say, «Well, I’m too old. I’m too young. I’m too set in my ways. I’m just going to get along and go along.» Oh no, you see, God shows off His greatest strength at the point of our greatest weakness. When I’m weak, God gets a chance to show off His strength if I’m yoked with Him.

You say, «Well, how in the world does this operate?» Years ago, there was a camp for junior high kids, and this year the counselor invited Billy to go. Now, Billy was a special child-sweet, kind, loving, gentle, but special. He didn’t really get along with the other kids, but you just couldn’t upset him. He was teased all the time-laughed at. Remember junior high? We’ve been on both sides of that, right?

But Billy went to camp, and at camp, they teased him unmercifully, but it didn’t bother him at all. He was at camp with the kids, and he’d say, «Which way is the craft shop?» They’d point in the opposite direction; they loved teasing Billy. Finally, someone signed Billy’s name up to do the morning devotional. They had a little talk every morning at breakfast, and different kids would sign up to give some kind of spiritual talk. They signed up Billy. Billy didn’t know it. At breakfast the next day, the counselor said, «Billy has asked to speak today to do our devotional.» Billy didn’t know, and all the kids just laughed and thought, «Watch this; it’s no telling what Billy is going to say.»

Little Billy got up with his smile, and with all the giggling of the junior high kids, it took him two and a half minutes to say «Jesus loves me,» and another two and a half minutes for him to say, «I love Jesus.» That was it. The room got so quiet. All those junior high kids, some of them began to weep and cry, and that was the camp when so many of those boys and girls really came into a personal relationship with Jesus Christ that lasted for the rest of their lives.

Years went by in that community; someone would say, «Well, Alice, when did you come to know Jesus?» She would say, «I was at camp when Billy spoke!» «I was at camp when Billy spoke!» God shows off His strength when we get yoked up with Him. We come to Him just the way we are, we take up that yoke He’s prepared for us, we sit at His feet, we learn from Him, and then we have peace with God and the peace of God. Guess what? We are no longer fainting goats.