Proverbs 26:11. Like a dog that returns to his vomit is a fool who repeats his folly.
I recently travelled to England to a little town called Keswick. I think there were more dogs living there than people. Dogs in sweaters. Dogs in strollers. Dogs in seat belts in cars (that’s actually the law over there). Dogs in Keswick can go everywhere the people go. Stores. Hotels. Restaurants. They love dogs in England.
In ancient times people hated dogs, especially in Israel. Dogs were considered spiritually unclean. They wandered the streets as beggars, eating garbage. They were annoying at best, and dangerous at worst.
Some dogs eat their own vomit. I know, gross. The proverb compares the fool to this kind of dog. A person who repeats the same foolish behavior over and over, is like a dog who vomits and then eats it. If you’re thinking, that’s disgusting, then you get the point. The proverb uses this disgusting illustration because it wants us to understand just how bad our sin is, especially when we keep habitually repeating it.
If you ask Google why dogs eat their own vomit (which I did), it will say it’s because they find their own vomit to be tasty. They enjoy it. Do you enjoy your sin? Likely you do. If you thought it was disgusting you wouldn’t keep doing it. You would reject it, the way the body rejects something and vomits it out. But the truth is that we do the same thing when we return to the same sins, the same bad habits, the same way of thinking, and worst of all, the same way of not trusting Jesus, over and over again.
Peter will quote this proverb when describing how some leave the faith due to the logic of the false teachers:
2 Peter 2:22. 20For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. 21For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than after knowing it to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them. 22What the true proverb says has happened to them: “The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire.”
Make no mistake the “Christian” who becomes entangled in the same sin of unbelief that they were living in prior to knowing Christ, is like the dog that returns to his vomit. They reveal their true nature by what they return to. Only a dog eats its own puke, not people. Only an unbeliever returns to their unbelief, not a true child of God. As much as we’d like to believe that the one who is living in unbelief made a profession of faith as a child, therefore they are saved, the truth is they’re not. They’re a dog not a human. They’re an unbeliever, not a believer.
In Christ, we are no longer dogs. Our very nature has been changed. The proof? We don’t return to our vomitous ways. We don’t wallow in the mud after being clean. As with the Prodigal Son, the mud makes no sense to us. It’s not who we are meant to be. Sons not slaves. Children of God, not dogs or pigs.
Christian, Jesus saved you not only so that you will go to Heaven someday, but so that TODAY you would stop returning to the same sins, the same foolish thoughts and actions of unbelief that you once lived in. In Christ, we have a new heart that loves God. The more we trust his love for us, the more our new nature produces a disgust for the vomit of our sin.
You: Do you return to the same sin over and over? Have you returned to the vomit of unbelief?
You in Christ: How does your union with Christ sustain your faith in God on a daily basis?
Christ in you: Is there a specific sin or lack of faith that you need to forsake today?
Pray: Father, may I never return to the vomit of unbelief. By your Spirit keep my faith burning in me until I am fully like your Son. Amen.
To Live is Christ 