I was at my favorite coffee shop today and they always have a fun little gimmick to garner tips. I think it is brilliant, by the way, and I fall for it every time. They put two small buckets in front of the register and post above them two choices and you drop your tip into your vote. For example, one will be DC and the other Marvel, Star Wars vs. Star Trek, Booberry vs. Frankenberry. You get the picture.
Today the choices were Tom vs. Jerry. Now, this has been quite the debate among scholars for decades with valid and poignant arguments on both sides. I'd like to throw my hat into the ring and offer up my valid and poignant argument:
I think Jerry is a little punk!
I know there are many who agree with me in my assessment, but let me elaborate and tell you why...
Tom is a cat. He is a predator. He holds rank at the top of his respective food chain. He shares a bloodline with such noble creatures as lions, tigers and (a personal favorite) jaguars. These beasts are created by God to hunt and they do it well.
Jerry is vermin. He is the prey. He is disease ridden and steals food. HE STEALS FOOD! Ain't nobody gonna steal my food and go unpunished. Yet many people seem sympathetic to "poor Jerry's" plight? What is that?
I lived in a house a while back that had a mess of stray cats basically living under it. We would have seasons of new litters being born under the house and with a each season a new wave of strays to roam the neighborhood. I'm sure it was scandalous in the house pet world. BUT did we have vermin? I can assure you we did not! ( I will say that the cats were ousted later on my a family of raccoons, but that is another story).
What I am saying is that Tom is simply doing what he was created for; what nature has deemed proper and right.
JERRY, on the other hand, is a manipulative, abusive little punk!! He's an instigator and I do not abide instigators.
Now I am aware that this argument has cropped up before. There is a "Leave Tom Alone!" camp. I would like to outline the spiritual significance of this observation.
Let me first point out that Tom belongs. He is the chosen pet. He is meant to be in that house. Jerry, on the other hand, is a pest that lives in the walls. He is certainly not wanted. He is throwing off the equilibrium of the household. Are we beginning to see the correlation here?
If we use Tom as an allegory for our lives and the home as our home on earth, we can then assume then that Jerry is the embodiment of evil that comes to harass and torment us and push into doing some really stupid things.
Yes, Jerry is Satan. I can't think of a better character that personifies the antagonistic nature of our Enemy while garnering the sympathies of the masses. He is an invader in our home and try as we might to live a normal, quiet, God-fearing life, we are continually taunted and tricked by this incessant vermin.
Tom's nature as a cat is to eliminate this pest. Yet try as he might, the slippery rodent eludes him and turns his efforts against him resulting in some serious anvil-on-the-head kind of pain. In the same way, we live in a world that is ruled in much the same way that Jerry "rules" Tom's home. The Enemy instigates and antagonizes and prompts reactions from us and left to our own power we respond as we are designed to: we lash out in order to protect what we hold sacred because THAT IS WHAT WE ARE DESIGNED TO DO. However, we let our anger get the best of us and eventually we look around and see that the house we were trying to protect is categorically demolished from floor rug to ceiling fan leaving the Master of the House no choice but to render the consequences for our OWN actions.
Fortunately for us, we have something that Tom does not. We have Jesus. We have an example of what it looks like to direct our God-given nature to protect in healthy and loving ways. Instead of bringing the house down around our ears, destroying relationships, causing pain to ourselves, we can rely on our Savior to secure the house and restore the damage we have already inflicted.
What would this look like in amazing, animated technicolor? I would imagine it would come in the form of a kind-faced, overall-ed exterminator that would wipe that smug little mousey smirk right off that punk face.
Long live Tom!!
So, who do YOU root for? Leave your thoughts
