Am I My Brother’s Keeper?

The muskrat looked through a crack in the wall to see the farmer and his wife opening a package. What food might it contain? He was aghast to discover that it was a muskrat trap.

Retreating to the farmyard the muskrat proclaimed the warning; “There is a muskrat trap in the house, a muskrat trap in the house!”

The chicken clucked and scratched, raised her head and said, “Excuse me, Mr. Muskrat, I can tell this is a grave concern to you, but it is of no consequence to me. I cannot be bothered by it.”

The muskrat turned to the pig and told him, “There is a muskrat trap in the house!”

“I am so very sorry Mr. Muskrat,” sympathized the goat, “but there is nothing I can do about it. Be assured that you are in my prayers.”

The muskrat turned to the cow. She rudely replied, ! “A muskrat trap? I am in grave danger… Not!”

So the muskrat returned to the house, head down and dejected, to face the farmer’s trap alone.

That very night a sound was heard throughout the house, like the sound of a muskrat trap catching its prey. The farmer’s wife rushed to see what was caught. In the darkness, she did not see that it was a venomous snake whose tail the trap had caught. The snake bit the farmer’s wife.

The farmer rushed her to the hospital. She returned home with a fever. The farmer determined the best way to treat a fever was with fresh chicken soup, so he took his hatchet to the farmyard for the soup’s main ingredient.

His wife’s sickness continued so that friends and neighbors came to sit with her around the clock. To feed them the farmer returned to the barnyard for the goat.

The farmer’s wife did not get well. So many people came for her funeral that the farmer next retrieved the cow to provide a meal for all of them to eat.

The next time you hear that someone is facing a problem and think that it does not concern you, remember that when there is a muskrat trap in the house, the whole farmyard is at risk.
“Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Genesis 4:9d)