The Case of the Trapped Goats

Claire Black: Welcome to True Girl, a podcast for girls and their moms. I’m Claire Black. Together, we’ll explore God’s truth for us, one drive at a time! Buckle up. You’re about to grow closer to each other and closer to Jesus!

Song:

I am a true girl.
Oh, oh, oh, oh.
I am, I am, I am a true girl!

Welcome to a new season of the podcast. We’re calling this one, “More Lessons from the Barnyard!” (That’s because a while ago we did a series called “Faith Lessons from the Barnyard.” Go listen to it!)

If you’ve listened to this podcast for a while, you know that Dannah lives on a farm. That’s where we’re headed today!

Dannah Gresh calls her farm animals “creature teachers”—her horses, goats, and peacocks teach her about God’s character and power. That idea comes from Romans 1, verse 20, which tells us that God’s creation helps us see what He is like.

This season, we’re starting with a mystery: the case of the trapped goats. Every morning, Dannah comes outside and her goats are missing. And every morning, she finds them in the same strange place.

How are they getting in there? And why can’t they get out?

Listen up, because I think you’re about to learn something really cool about God. Dannah and her friend Suzy Weibel are just coming back from an early morning walk with Dannah’s dog Moosie and a whole pack of Suzy’s Bernese Mountain Dogs. 

Here’s Suzy.

Suzy Weibel: Moosie! Look at you keeping up with the Berners!

Dannah Gresh: Not bad for a thirteen-year-old labradoodle! He’s pretty proud of himself.

Suzy: He should be! He just kept up with an entire pack of Bernese Mountain Dogs.

Dannah: Okay, everyone! We are home sweet home!

Oh no!

Suzy: What? 

Dannah: Not again!

Suzy: What?

Dannah: Where are the goats?

Suzy: The goats?

Dannah: They’re supposed to be right there in the pasture!

Suzy: I see horses. I see Carl Epley, the black sheep of the family. I see . . .

Dannah: NO GOATS!

Suzy: Did they get out?

Dannah: Well . . . This happened yesterday morning . . . and the day before that, too!

Suzy: Your goats disappeared?

Dannah: Yep!

Suzy: Where’d you find them?

Dannah: I have a theory.

Suzy: About your missing goats?

Dannah: Come on!

Suzy: Where are we going?

Dannah: Let me show you…

[goat bleat]

Dannah: Just as I thought!

Suzy: Well, there you are!

[much goat bleating]

Dannah: 1 . . . 2 . . . 3 . . . 4 . . . 5. Yep, everyone’s here!

Suzy: In the peacock run?!

Dannah: The peacock run! Yes.

[gate unlatching]

Dannah: Let’s go, boys. Everyone out!

[bleating and shuffling]

Dannah: Good boy, Sam-I-Am. Lead the way! Come on, Lorax. You, too!

Suzy: I still think it’s hilarious that you named all your goats after Dr. Seuss characters. 

Have you ever thought of getting twins and naming them Thing 1 and Thing 2?

Dannah: Me? No! Farmer Bob? Absolutely yes!

Suzy: How did five goats get into the peacock pen three days in a row?

Dannah: That, Suzy Weibel, is the mystery of my life right now.

But you know, while I’m trying to figure it out, God has taught me something really cool.

Suzy: As per usual, do tell!

Dannah: Well, yesterday when I found them here for the second time, I was all at once overwhelmed with worry: “What if I hadn’t found them?” “What if it got too hot and they needed water before I came.”

But then, I was like, “Dannah, You did find them! And you always will come for them.”

Suzy: Because you watch them faithfully!

Dannah: Exactly. I count heads every morning, look out to the pasture to make sure everyone is moving. Then, I come out to be sure they have water.

Suzy: Every morning.

Dannah: Yeah. Then, well, I thought of Lamentations 3:22–23. You probably know it. Listen to this:

The faithful love of the LORD never ends! His mercies never cease.
Great is his faithfulness; his mercies begin afresh each morning.

Suzy: That’s a really sweet verse from a kinda sad book. Each morning!

Dannah: Each morning. I’m starting to feel like that’s how often I have to rescue these little, knucklehead goats. And that’s what got me thinking. These goats keep getting themselves into the same jam. And every morning, there I am again, opening the gate for them.

Now, I’m not saying we’re goats . . .

Suzy: Speak for yourself!

Dannah: . . . but don’t we do that sometimes? We make a bad choice. We lose our temper. We say something unkind. We know what God wants us to do, and we don’t do it.

We feel sorry. God rescues us from whatever it is. 

And then we wake up the next morning and get in the same jam we were in the day before.

Suzy: And the Lord comes for us again.

Dannah: Yes. God’s mercy doesn’t run out.

Suzy: Mercy, now there’s something I’m glad God has a lot of.

Dannah: Got that right!

Suzy: Mercy is when God doesn’t treat us as our sins deserve. We mess up. We disobey. But when we turn to Him, we find that He is compassionate and ready to forgive. 

Dannah: And that’s important because, as you mentioned earlier, this verse was written during a really dark time. God’s people had rebelled against Him. Jerusalem had been destroyed. There was real sadness and very real consequences for their sin. And right in the middle of all that sadness, the writer of Lamentations remembers something that gives him hope: God is still faithful.

Suzy: Even when His people haven’t been.

Dannah: Yes. God’s faithfulness is part of who He is. And when we belong to Him, we can come to Him and confess our sin and ask for forgiveness . . . again. His mercy is there. Fresh.

Suzy: Like the morning!

Dannah: Yesterday’s mess did not use up today’s mercy.

[goat bleat]

Dannah: Hey, there Horton. I love you, because you are a big knuckle head.

Suzy: Huh, that makes me think . . .

Sometimes when things don’t go the way I planned, I get this empty feeling. I don’t know how to describe it, but it’s a sadness, a heaviness. It feels like it will never go away; like it will always kind of be sitting on me. But then I remind myself that I’ve felt this way before . . . a lot! And you know what? If you asked me when the last time was that I felt that way, I probably couldn’t even tell you. All I can tell you from experience with God’s faithful promises is that that heaviness, that sadness, DOESN’T last forever. The sadness goes away. Even the memory of it sometimes fades. Joy comes in the morning. 

Dannah: So true.

Suzy: I wonder, wouldn’t it be good to figure out how they’re getting in here?

Dannah: It sure would be! I’m about to go on tour with True Girl, and I don’t want Farmer Bob having to come out here every morning and find these guys. But I’ve thought about it for three days. I’m dumbfounded! I’ve no idea how this is happening.

[horses approaching]

Suzy: Whoa! Here come the big guys!

Dannah: Hey, there my little horse herd!

[gate scraping and creeking]

Suzy: Dannah, what is Stormy Joy doing?

[itching]

Dannah: Well, I’d guess she has an itch . . . uhm . . . back there. Stormy Joy, be a lady!

Suzy: She’s scratching that itch real good . . . on the peacock fence!!

Dannah! Now I have a theory . . . yep . . .

[gate moving; scraping]

Suzy: Look at the fence! She’s moving it away from the barn just enough to . . .

[goat bleat]

Suzy: The Lorax!

Dannah: He just slipped through!

Suzy: Mystery solved!

Dannah: So, Stormy Joy scratches her . . . uh . . . hind quarters . . .

Suzy: . . . then the fence moves . . .

Dannah: . . . and the goats seize the opportunity.

Suzy: Into the peacock run they go!

Dannah: Mystery solved!

Suzy: Except now the Lorax is stuck again!

[goat bleats]

Dannah: Lorax! Go out the way you came in, dude!

Suzy: Dannah, he can't understand you, he’s a goat!

Dannah: And yet I continue to expect so much!

Claire: Well, it looks like Farmer Bob has a fix-it project to do on the Gresh Farm!

And in case you’re wondering, yes, that really happened. Dannah kept finding her goats in the peacock run, and she really was reminded of God’s faithful mercy—it is new every morning.

And that mercy—God’s forgiving love—is for you, too. When you need help, call out to God. Ask Him for mercy. He loves to hear you pray, and you can trust Him to give you exactly what you need each day.

Before you go today, we want to invite you to the True Girl Crazy Hair Tour. This fall, Dannah will be at all ten of our tour stops! Our worship leader is Dove Award winning recording artist, Yancy. Your mom can learn more and get tickets at MyTrueGirl.com.

There are events in Atlanta, Panama City, Florida, plus Louisiana, West Virginia, Ohio, New Jersey—and we’re ending in Pennsylvania! In each city Dannah is doing a special workshop for moms about raising pure kids.” It includes lunch and is limited to small groups. So, mom’s workshop during the lunch hour, and the True Girl Crazy Hair Tour for moms and girls in the evenings. Learn more at MyTrueGirl.com.

Hope to see you there!

Song:

Oh, oh, oh, oh.
I am a true girl.
Oh, oh, oh, oh.
I am, I am, I am a true girl!

The True Girl podcast is a production of Revive Our Hearts, calling women of all ages to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

*Offers available only during the broadcast of the podcast season.