The baby slept soundly in his swing while a scorpion stealthily skulked down the suspension cord above him. His father, Kino, stared like a snake ready to strike, carefully calculating how to kill the eight-legged intruder. But the predator didn’t give him time to play chess, and injected the infant with his toxic tail. The boy was engulfed in agony and Kino was consumed with anger, prompting him to seize the fiend, smash him into a paste within his hand, and hurl the scorpion’s remains into the dirt. The newborn’s mother frantically attempted to extract the venom with her lips, and they hurried him to the town physician in hopes of saving his life—a debacle that could have been averted entirely had Kino simply grabbed the baby instead of facing down a foe he was powerless to conquer. 

Kino, why didn’t you snatch your son from the scorpion? Why did you fight when you should have fled with the boy? That is what you will shout from the reader’s chair while reading John Steinbeck’s short novella, The Pearl. The book commences with the aforementioned fictional story of baby Coyotito being struck by a scorpion because Kino ran headlong into a fight he should have ran away from while cradling his son. Sometimes, the surest strategy for subduing certain foes is retreating rather than trying to prove how strong you are only to demonstrate that you aren’t. 

Likewise, the Author of Scripture repeatedly shouts to believers, “Don’t fight when you should flee.” The Lord certainly commands Christians to stand firm against Satan and valiantly fight the good fight (Eph. 6:11; 1 Tim. 6:12), but there are some spiritual skirmishes that believers need to run away from rather than run toward with guns a-blazing. Paul exhorted the Corinthians with desperate urgency in his voice, “Flee from sexual immorality” (1 Cor. 6:18), and later on, “Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry” (1 Cor. 10:14). When intense temptations for sexual sin and idol-worship come crawling down the rope, that is not the time to show off how spiritually mature you are—that is time to get out of Dodge and make a run for it. Retreat doesn’t mean defeat—sometimes the best strategy for survival is to run as far away and as fast as you can. 

Joseph of old employed this tactic when Potiphar’s spouse sought to seduce him. He didn’t negotiate with temptation or stick around to prove his competence—he ran for the hills (Gen. 39:12). Samson, on the other hand, lingered with Delilah foolishly thinking that he could conquer the allure of sin with his great might—and he lost (Judges 16:4-22). Don’t fight every spiritual scorpion that slithers your way—know when to run like your soul depends on it, because it does. “The prudent sees danger and hides himself,” wrote Solomon, “but the simple go on and suffer for it” (Prov. 22:3).

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