Getting caught

Living in West Africa afforded our family many opportunities to be exposed to “wild” animals. Even though these wild animals were a long way from our home, our kids grew up with exotic animals. Villagers learned quickly that I would buy most any animal from the wild, so they regularly brought us all sorts of creatures.

I never paid much for any species, but the villagers were very happy to get anything for something that they thought was so trivial as a wild animal.  At one time or another we had a baby crocodile, a bush baby, a dikdik (miniature antelope), a monkey, an African Gray parrot, and so forth. The kids enjoyed caring for them and they learned a lot about caring for animals—although they had plenty of experience caring for our flock of chickens, goats, sheep, pigs, ducks, a horse, donkeys, cows, turkeys, guineas, and rabbits.

One day a man that I had never seen came to our gate with a pair of elephant tusks tied on the back of his bicycle. The tusks had blood on the tusks that was not yet dry. The man told me that he cut them out of a “dead” elephant earlier that day. I had my doubts about how that elephant became classified as “dead.”

They were a beautiful pair of ivory tusks, and he wanted to sell them to me for a very small amount of their value. I really wanted those tusks. I was salivating to buy them, but a small voice in my head was saying to me, “You know that it’s unlawful to possess uncut ivory in this country,” But, another voice was saying, “You will never have another opportunity for a buy like this. Those tusks are worth a lot of money.” I was thinking about how good they would look decorating our home, but then I was thinking of how quickly our family could be expelled from the country.

Sound judgment prevailed and I did not buy them, and I quickly asked the man to leave our property as I did not want to be caught with those tusks at my home. I have thought many times about this incident and particularly about what made me decide not to buy the tusks. Was it that I did not want to break the law, or, rather, was it because I was afraid of getting caught? I must confess that it was the latter. I was more afraid of what others would say about me if I got caught or what they would think about me for buying contraband. I knew the right thing to do, but I was VERY tempted to do what I knew was wrong. Being tempted is not a sin, but if I had bought those tusks it would have been wrong.

So, whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin (James 4:17).