It's Hard to Kick Against the Goads

A couple days ago I was reading the Bible and came across the Acts 26:14 where Paul retells about his conversion. The phrase that God said to him was

"Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads."

This immediately reminded me of the Johnny Cash song "When the Man Comes Around," which quotes part of this phrase.

"When the Man Comes Around" - Johnny Cash
It's hard for thee to kick against the pricks.
Till Armageddon, no Shalom, no Shalom

I knew before this morning how to use goad as a verb, but I did not know what it was as a noun. So this morning when I woke up with the song in my head I looked it up in dictionary. Turns out a goad (also called a prick) is simply a cattle prod...a stick to push cattle where you want them to go. So in Acts God was telling Paul to stop resisting "The Way" (early term used for Christians) as it is part of God's plan to use him.

Now with that knowledge looking at the Johnny Cash song I realize he was saying that he will not have peace until the end of time because he feels he is going against the path God had laid out for him. I hope that he stopped kicking against the goads and now has his peace.