Don’t Kick the Obnoxious Donkey Blocking Your Way
Note: the inspiration for this piece came from a devotional from Laurie Beth Jones’s book titled “Jesus, CEO: Using Ancient Wisdom for Visionary Leadership.”
An obnoxious donkey is blocking your way on the path to success. That beast of burden brays and bucks and you just can’t get the stubborn animal to move.
The only thing that stands between you and your goal is that obstinate donkey.
Before you go kicking and beating the donkey to move it out of your way, you better take the time to discern why the donkey is blocking your way.
Balaam was a fool to kick the donkey
The Bible tells a story in Numbers 22 about a man named Balaam who had a stubborn donkey who refused to obey him.
A Moabite king summoned Balaam to pronounce a curse on the people of Israel. As Balaam made his way to the Moabite king in order to curse Israel, Balaam’s donkey saw what he could not: the angel of the Lord was blocking the way with a sword in hand ready to strike down Balaam.
Irritated, frustrated, and angry by the donkey’s seemingly unfriendly behavior, Balaam began beating his donkey into submission. The donkey refused to budge.
Balaam beat that donkey three times until the Lord finally opened the donkey’s mouth to reveal that it was Balaam who was acting like a foolish ass.
The immovable donkey was keeping Balaam from pronouncing a curse on God’s people. More than that, that stubborn donkey was protecting Balaam from the sword of judgment.
Balaam was being taught a powerful lesson: Don’t kick the donkey! God might have that donkey in your way for a reason.
God doesn’t always explain the donkey
I plastered the phrase “Don’t Kick the Donkey” to the wall of my office in 2015 as a simple reminder that obstacles in our way may be there for a divine reason.
If there ever was a year at Logos Academy that we wanted to kick the donkey in our path, 2015 was it. Roughly half of our school’s tax credit funding, about $750,000 in scholarship funds, was lost due in large part to a 9-month Pennsylvania state budget impasse that held up funds.
Like a stubborn donkey that refused to listen, we were unable to move this obstacle out of our path.
Irritation, frustration, and simmering anger pushed us to metaphorically do all we could to beat or kick that donkey out of our way. Nothing we did seemed to move the donkey. It was such a frustrating year of waiting, grumbling, and never making progress.
The donkey finally moved in 2016 and it took us two years to financially recover from the massive loss. I can’t say I fully understand the divine reasons for that budget impasse, but God knows.
God can use the donkeys in our way for surprising good
Events that look like they will harm us are ones that God loves to use for our good.
The Old Testament patriarch Joseph learned this lesson well. He was mistreated by his brothers who sold him into slavery, was falsely accused of rape by his employer’s wife, thrown into prison, and forgotten by those he helped in prison.
One might say that Joseph had plenty of donkeys he could have tried to kick out of his way.
Yet, Joseph trusted God and remained faithful. Years after his brother’s mistreatment he told them, “You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good.”
Joseph refused to kick the donkey but trusted his future to God.
Jesus himself deserved nothing but a life of ease and blessing as he went around blessing, healing, and helping others. Instead, he faced numerous stubborn donkeys on his way: false accusations, questions about his identity, claims that he was possessed by demons, a gross miscarriage of justice in his trial, a wooden cross used to torture and kill him.
Yet, Jesus endured the cross, scorned its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God (Hebrews 12:2, NIV).
Jesus never kicked the donkey but entrusted Himself to the Father.
Will you see the donkey as an obstacle or an opportunity?
We have a choice to see the donkeys in our path as obstacles keeping us from progress or as opportunities to see God work in surprising ways.
COVID-19 seemed like a really irritating donkey in 2020 and 2021. Perhaps God put that donkey in our way for reasons we may never know.
You might have run into a brick wall time and again trying to close a business deal that just won’t close. Don’t kick the donkey. Embrace the truth that God is in control.
More times than not, I have felt that God has hemmed me in as a leader so that I could not move the organization where I wanted to go. God may have been protecting me from doing something damaging or stupid.
That irritating sickness, difficult relationship, the obstinate legislative process, increased line of credit, or loss of tax credit funds can be seen in one of two ways: obstacles to progress or opportunities to wait on the God who always works for our good.
We don’t yet have a full vision of how the Lord sorts out our hardships for our good. Faith reminds us though that all things work together for good for those who love God (Romans 8:28, NIV).
In early May of this year, we broke ground at Logos Academy on a $4.3M campus expansion. I could have never envisioned that we would be in this place back in 2015 when a donkey was standing in our way. God was fully in control back then and we just needed to wait and see how He would sort it all out.
Don’t kick the obnoxious donkey blocking your way. God might have a good reason that donkey is standing in the way.
