Canine Theology

Day 162 (Written Tuesday May 22) ~

There are churches today who are offering services for people and their pets, even offering communion for both man and beast. This is not a blog about that. This is a blog about what I learned about my own faith from watching my dog Fez tonight. In March of 2011 Po was mowing the yard when he noticed something hiding in the tall grass. He stopped the mower and went over to investigate, only to discover a tiny little ball of white and black fur buried in the green grass. It was a puppy. He picked her up (able to hold her in the palm of his hand) and came walking across the yard. I witnessed all of this from a distance and thought to myself, “Oh no. Whatever he found he will be in love with by the time he gets to the house and whatever it is will have to be fed.” Sure enough, I was right on both counts, but failed to realize She and the Oldest would be in love with it too. It was a tiny Jack Russell looking mutt puppy. You need to know a few things: #1 - I like animals just fine, but I don’t like having to take care of a pet. #2 - We already had a dog, a black lab named Saban who lives outside, requiring only a bowl of food each morning and evening. #3 - I am not an “animals are part of our family” type person (if you are I have no problem with that, it’s just not who I am). #4 - We were leaving the next week to go to Fort Wayne, Indiana for a weeklong Gospel meeting, and, after our nine hour drive, we would be staying in a hotel the whole time. Despite all of the previously mentioned facts, somehow I found myself paying a pet deposit and bringing this little fur ball along for the trip. Not only that, we wind up walking out of Pet Smart with a little green sweater for her. I AM NOT THAT PERSON, but somehow I had become that person. By the end of that trip, Fez was part of the family (and living in my house, something I had never allowed before). Fast forward a year to tonight. It was about 8:30 pm, dinner was finished, chores were done, so She and I decided to sit on the back deck and enjoy the cool evening following the rain storm. Anytime you go outside, Fez assumes that you are there to entertain her. I spent the next ten minutes playing a little game with Fez that I like to call “Let her attack me with tooth and claw until she grows exhausted or bored or both.” It is her absolute favorite game. While playing this game, she suddenly did something bizarre and interesting. All at once she took off, ran under a bush and came out with something in her mouth. I thought it must be a lizard (one thing she loves about South Georgia is chasing lizards), a mouse or a bird. She ran to the other side of the flower bed and started digging. You must understand, because it is all sand, this little puppy can dig a very big and deep hole in a matter of seconds. After digging a nearly one foot deep hole she put her prize in the hole and began using her nose to fill the hole in and bury whatever it was. She returned to playing for a minute and then stopped, ran back to the place where she buried her treasure and dug it up. This time she took it back under the bush. A minute later she buried it again. By this time I am getting curious as to what she has, and anticipate being able to play my favorite game called “Annoy Fez.” Jade and I started following her to her hiding places acting like we were going to get whatever she had buried. She did not like this at all. She acted all nervous, protective, jealous, stingy, whatever emotions a dog is capable of feeling. Fez did not want us to get her “precious.” Finally I was able to get behind the bush and dig up her buried treasure, while fighting her off as she tried desperately to protect it and keep me from getting it. She was able to get it (it was buried in sand, I had no idea what I was looking for and she has the added assistance of a very good sense of smell), but I caught her and pried it out of her mouth. You know what it was? It was a rotten apple core that I had thrown out nearly two weeks ago. This was her prized possession that she so desperately wanted and wanted to keep from anyone else. She and I (my wife, not Fez) had a good laugh and then went in to do some other things. An hour later I was sitting in the floor attaching mounting brackets to the blinds on our back porch door and was thinking about Fez. This is where the theology lesson kicked in. I wonder if my Master sees me with the same pity and sadness that I had toward Fez? He provides me with everything I need and also is present in my life and willing to spend time with me. How often do I stop to spend time in fellowship with Him, only to get distracted in a few minutes and go chasing after some other perceived treasure that is actually worthless? Fez spends much of the day alone, wishing we would come out back to spend some time with her, and when I did, she got distracted by something that was thrown out as trash. Do we not long for a closer relationship with God, desiring to be with Him, to know He is there and to have Him active in our lives? He is gladly present (I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world (Matthew 28:20)....I will never leave you nor forsake you (Hebrews 13:5) and yet it is we who walk away to chase after worthless things. Things we try to hide from others. Things we don’t want others to have. Things that we can’t walk away from for even a few minutes. Things that distress us as we worry about losing them or someone else getting them. Things that distract us from what we really want and need...time with Him. Fez doesn’t realize it, but that rotten apple core won’t last too much longer. Gradually it will wither, rot and dissolve into nothing. That is precisely what will happen to all of those shiny, new, expensive things that draw our attention away from God and consume our time. The new gets old. The shiny grows dull. The expensive loses its value. It will all turn to dust. They say a dog is man’s best friend, but on this night, my dog, was this man’s greatest teacher.