The Wet Monkey Syndrome: Do You Have It?

Missionary work is tough, but we get a lot done because we are careful to cultivate a positive attitude and to make that the emotional environment or culture in our church and Bible College.I enjoy reading and listening to Christian business man and author Dan Miller. I heard him tell a great story explaining why many suffer from a "Can't Do It" culture and the importance of not being a wet blanket.

"Imagine a cage containing five monkeys. Inside the cage there is a banana on a string. Before long a monkey walks over and reaches for the banana. As soon as he touches the banana, all the monkeys are sprayed with cold water. After a while, another monkey makes an attempt to grab the banana with the same result. All the monkeys are instantly sprayed with cold water. Pretty soon, when another monkey tries to reach for the banana, the other monkeys will try to stop him. 

Now forget the cold water. Remove one monkey from the cage and replace it with a new one. The new monkey sees the banana and obviously goes over and starts to grab it. But to his surprise, all of the other monkeys attack him to prevent him from touching the banana. Next, remove another of the original monkeys and replace it with a new one. Now all of the monkeys currently in the cage stop the new one from getting to the banana. Replace the third, fourth and fifth monkeys with new ones. Each one becomes a willing opponent to allowing anyone to touch that banana.


Now, none of the monkeys in the cage at this point were every sprayed with cold water. But they continue to prevent each other from grabbing that banana, the one food that they should all naturally love.

None of these monkeys ever approaches the banana again. They have no idea why it's off limits. But that's just the way things have always been done around here.

Sound familiar? If you walked in to your work, church, marriage, or neighborhood as an unbiased outsider, what would you question about the "normal" activities there? Are you accepting old traditions that defy the intelligence or spiritual insight you have today?"