1 Corinthians 10:1-11:1

As Australians we're an inventive lot
Like how once we built a Dingo fence in the middle of the outback
built to keep the dingo's out and the stock in

It started in 1880 and finished in 1885 it runs from Jimbour on the Darling Downs near Dalby through thousands of kilometres of arid land ending west of Eyre peninsula on cliffs of the Nullarbor Plain above the Great Australian Bight near Nundroo.

That's 5,614 km of fence all for one purpose of keeping dingos and other predators out to protect the sheep and cattle

You know the trouble with fences don't you
Somehow, someway they just develop holes in them

So the sheep that roam near them
There's something that you know's going to happen as well

sheep and cattle always seem to find the holes in the fence

Like the song "Dumb ways to die" like dressing up as a moose in hunting season

sheep find the dumbest of them all

Sheep are genius for finding a hole or weak spot in the fence line

where they find themselves leading the rest into dangerous terrain where they have no skills of protecting themselves

It's a bit like what Paul points the way to today in the way he recaps the journey of God's people

as the people of God we can start to look just like the sheep out riding the boundary fences

As someone put it this way
We are not mentally defective, but there seems to be considerable evidence that we might be spiritually defective, with one exception: we have an absolute genius for finding whatever might serve as a loophole in the commandments and creed.

Paul directs our gaze to look back
look at ourselves to see what functional idols
We've made in our hearts

Has something or someone besides Jesus the Christ taken title to your heart's trust, preoccupation, loyalty, service, fear and delight?

As we read in 1 Corinthians 10:1-5

10:1 For I do not want you to be ignorant of the fact, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud and that they all passed through the sea. 2 They were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. 3 They all ate the same spiritual food 4 and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ. 5 Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them; their bodies were scattered in the wilderness.

major land marks of the Old Testament
We get swept along on the grand tour of Israel's potted history
drawn back in time to Exodus

Like the miraculous crossing of the red sea feet dry
Or the water that comes from the rock
to quench their parched throats