Starting Right is a 5 minute Day Starter to help keep you motivated, encouraged, and focused throughout your day. DannyMac is a pastor, teacher, motivational speaker, husband, and father. His years of leading and training people have given him vast experience in helping individuals to accomplish change in their lives and meet their goals. He can help you set the course for your day by offering practical advice from God's Word in a positive and fun way. There is no better way to begin your day than by Starting Right with DannyMac.
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A half-wolf with a taste for chickens sounds like an odd place to find life advice, but Jack London's White Fang story hits a nerve fast. We start with a simple picture: instinct lunges toward what looks good, a steady voice calls it back, and over time a wild heart learns a new “law.” That’s not just animal training, it’s a map for daily self-control when no one is watching and the temptation is right in front of us.
We connect that image to real life “chickens” the distractions and desires that grab our attention, promise quick satisfaction, and quietly steer our day. Some choices are clearly wrong, but plenty fall into the harder category: not sinful, just not beneficial. That’s why we lean on 1 Corinthians 10:23 and ask a sharper question than “Can I?” We ask “Will this help me?” “Will this create problems I don’t need?” and “Will this move me toward the life God wants for me?”
From there, we ground it in John 10:27: listening to Jesus, learning His voice, and choosing obedience one moment at a time. If you want a short Christian devotional, morning motivation, and a practical way to think about spiritual growth, this is a focused five-minute reset. Subscribe to Starting Right with Danny Mac, share it with a friend who’s battling distractions, and leave a review with the “chicken” you’re working to ignore.
Good morning and welcome to Starting Right with Danny Mack. I'm going to be here every Monday to Friday to help you get a great five-minute start to your day. So grab your cup of coffee, sit back, relax, and let me help you start your day right.
Here's a great story from Annie Payden this morning. Jack London's wonderful classic White Fang tells the story of an animal, half dog, half wolf, as he survives his life in the wild and then learns to live among men. There's one story in particular that has left a lasting impression on me. White Fang was very fond of chickens, and on one occasion he raided a chicken roost and killed fifty hens. His master, Whedon Scott, whom White Fang saw as a man god and loved with a single heart, scolded him and then took him into the chicken yard. When White Fang saw his favorite food walking around right in front of him, he obeyed his natural impulse and lunged for a chicken. He was immediately checked by his master's voice. They stayed in the chicken yard for quite a while, and every time White Fang made a move toward a chicken, his master's voice would stop him. In this way he learned what his master wanted. He had learned to ignore the chickens. Wheatonsc's father argued that you couldn't cure a chicken killer, but Whedon challenged him, and they agreed to lock White Fang in with the chickens all afternoon. In the book London Tells It This Way. Locked in the yard and there deserted by the master, White Fang laid down and went to sleep. Once he got up, walked over to the trough for a drink of water. The chickens he calmly ignored. So far as he was concerned, they did not exist. At four o'clock he executed a running jump, gained the roof of the chicken house, and leapt to the ground outside, where he sauntered gravely to the house. He had learned the law. Paydon continues now, out of the love and desire to obey his master's will, White Fang overcame his natural inborn desires. He may not have understood the reason, but he chose to bend his will to his master's.
Isn't amazing how animal stories have a way of breaking your heart and revealing a profound truth. The simplicity and purity of White Fang's love and devotion to his master helped me realize that my life will always be full of chickens. What I have to settle is whom will I serve? Just like White Fang, I think there's a little bit of that wild wolf in many of us. That part of us that really wants to make our own choices and do our own thing, and part of us that wants to be led by just whatever we want to do, whatever catches our eye. If we see something we like, we want to just
go after it. God has done so many wonderful things for us, and he's given us this ability to choose how we are wanting to live. But he then also gives us instructions as to how we should live. In John 10, 27, Jesus said, My sheep listen to my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. You see, there's this process by which God leads us by speaking to us, and then we learn to obey what he has said to us. We follow him, we do what he wants us to do. Just as White Fang had to learn to avoid the chickens. You know, there are so many chickens in our own lives. They are the things that distract us, that catch our eye, that we want to go after, that we think would be so great to have and do. And besides, we want to do it. But just like White Fang, we have to learn what the Master says. In First Corinthians chapter 10 and verse 23, we're told that all things are lawful, but not all things are beneficial. And that's part of the lessons that we need to learn in our lives. That the things that catch our eye that we feel we really want to do, it may not be totally wrong, but it's not necessarily the right thing either. And if we go after it, we can create problems for ourselves. Our goal should always be to listen to the Master's voice, to listen to what Jesus has taught us and is saying to us, because we know he is working to help us and to guide us. He wants the very best for us, and the only way we can experience his very best is to listen to what he says and become obedient to him. Yeah, there may be a little bit of wild wolf in many of us, but even a wild wolf can listen to the voice of his master and become better because of it.
Have a great day, my friends. We will talk again tomorrow. Thank you for listening today. And I invite you to join me Monday to Friday right here on Starting Right with Danny Mack.
