One of the more colorful folks to spend time in East Texas was Hoot Gibson, not the familiar cowboy star of some years ago, but a Gibson who liked the name, and claimed it. I knew Hoot when he was "retired", it seemed, loved horses, and could look like the ghost of Hank Williams. He had "southern gray magnificent" hair, sometimes wore a white suit, with a long white silk sash around his neck, driving an enormous long white Lincoln. An altogether like-able guy, he had made his living as a stunt man in Western movies. So, most of his stories concerned "horseback" in one way or another.
One story he loved to tell was about the day he decided to rope a deer. (I thought it was a tremendous feat to get close enough to do that, but he said that wasn't the dramatic part.) He roped a buck, who ran to the end of the rope, spun around, and came back at him full speed. The buck leaped over the horse, right over the saddle. Hoot said he looked down and saw that the deer's hoof had sliced a huge gash right across the saddle horn. And was headed to the end of the rope in the other direction. At full speed.
Knowing the deer just might come back like the last time, Hoot made a choice. The rope wasn't THAT valuable! With a quick move of his knife, the rope was cut and the deer ran free. Most importantly, the deer ran free AWAY.
Sometimes we need to make that quick response. The "rope" that binds us to an adventure gone wrong is not THAT valuable. We need to know how to cut loose. Every self-destructive sin once presented itself as an adventure or a pretty "good-idea-at-the-time! Choices are the stuff of life, Jesus said. Still true.
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