The Foxes that Attack the Fruitful Vineyard

UV 3673/10000 The Foxes that Attack the Fruitful Vineyard Catch the foxes for us, the little foxes that spoil and ruin the vineyards (of love), while our vineyards are in blossom. Song of Solomon 2 v 15 The little foxes referred to in the uni-verse are the sources of deception, false beliefs and evil desires that ensnare the human soul. The foxes are subtle and cunning and creep through our fences, our moral standards, beliefs and values and try to ruin our relationships and thereby, our joy, the joy of salvation. These try to ruin our fruitfulness by destroying the flowers when they are in blossom. Instead of being deceived or ensnared by these, we should set up traps for the foxes, early detection systems to detect them at the very beginning when they are trying to get in through the fences. Our fences of prayer and the word should be close linked and always in a good state of repair. We need to examine our perimeter security daily and take steps there and then to set it right. The foxes of pride, greed, insincerity, lust are notorious for destroying the fruit of the spirit. Many influential leaders have fallen prey to lust in recent days. It affects their testimonies and impacts their influence at the fag end of their lives. Prayer and the word of God are the effective remedies to deter these subtle foes of the soul. Like Samson caught a thousand foxes and set their tails on fire before freeing them into enemy territory, we need to daily catch these thousand foxes and set them free in satan’s realms, never to return to trouble us. If we fail to do so, we would end up feeding them and allowing the little foxes to grow big and mature when it is difficult to catch or deal with them. The little foxes will feed on our souls and affect our relationship with the Lord, the lover of our souls. They will nibble on our patience, our faith, our hope, our love, our willingness to forgive others. They will create bitterness in our hearts and keep us from yielding good fruit as the Lord’s faithful vineyard should. The abnormalities that these induce in our attitudes and actions would then subtly become our new normal. Like David guarded his sheep against predators, we need to guard the people given into our responsibility to lead, to teach, to minister to. A thousand foxes attack the flock of God. Hence, believers should be trained to identify the foxes, defend themselves and keep the foxes at bay. We should be more zealous to manifest and grow the nine fruit of the spirit than to possess and manifest the nine gifts of the spirit, to love God deeply and truly than to occupy the nine offices of the spirit. The foxes’ main target is to attack the fruitfulness of our lives for the vineyard of God is the battlefield of the enemy.