Two days ago I was walking my dog, Trip. We got Trip last February while he was only a few weeks old. We named him Trip because he tripped about every other step he took for the first few days, so it was fitting. Trip is now about a year and a half old, however he is a golden retriever. Therefore he's got a few more months of being a puppy.
Anyways, I was walking trip around the neighborhood which was something I hadn't done in quite some time. Usually my mom walks him or we play with him in the back yard. However I just happened to be bored so i decided to walk him. For those of you who don't know, my neighborhood is basically one large oval on a hill, the entrance at the top, my house at the bottom. So when we walk him, we generally just go all the way around said oval. Trip and I had made it about three fourths of the way up the hill when he basically stopped walking. My initial thought was oh he just needs to pee. But then he got weird and decided to just sit down. I shook the leash, yanked him. Yelled a little. Finally he stood up and walked a few feet, then he pulled from me. He layer down in the middle of the road, refusing to go any further. I had thought he was being stubborn because I had heard he got stung by a bee on a walk a few days ago. So i began to pull him thinking I wasn't going to let him develop this habit of being scared of one section of the neighborhood. He fought ruthlessly and after me yelling, pulling, and taking his leash, he got free. His collar was slightly loose and it just slipped right off. We made eye contact, me with a hint of fear/anger and him with a hint of freedom/confusion. He sprinted down the hill, me right after him shouting for him to come back. I am not as fast as him, nor do I have as much endurance. I would have never caught up to him, but finally he stopped. I told him to stay as i approached, he did. I got up to him, slid his collar on. I could have been mad at him... I almost wanted to. But my joy at him letting me come to him overpowered the anger. The joy of him coming back to me, in a sense, overpowered any sort of anger I had. He had the look on his face of "Oh lord, I'm about to be punished." You can tell with dogs. They put their heads down, don't look at you. But i praised him. Good boy, Trip! Good boy! Because at that point I cared less that he rain away. He came back. We eventually got back to the same spot, but instead of tugging him up the hill with the possibility of letting him loose again, I picked him up. He was fine with that, even though he is huge. I had to set him down a few times and rest, and it was hot...But we made it. And once we got to the top of the hill, i set him down and he was completely okay going down the other end of the hill back to our house. It was just one part he was scared of.
I love how closely that relates to the prodigal son. He ran off and eventually he came back. When he came back, the father wasn't the tinniest bit mad. He was ecstatic!
I think for me there are parts of life that are hard to get through. Rather I'm scared, angry, sad, anything. We just want to turn around and go back in the direction we came from. And I know that many times in my life i try going through that block that I know I'm scared of just to get to the comfortable stuff, the down hill, and I can't do it. We have to rely on God to pick us up and hold us if we want to get anywhere with him in this world. If we want to take the next step with him, or if we want to find him. Trip was not fine walking through that block, but he was completely content with me carrying him through it. Open the door that God is beating on and see what he will do.
PSALM 62:1-2
For God alone my soul waits in silence;
from him comes my salvation.
2 He alone is my rock and my salvation,
my fortress; I shall not be greatly shaken.
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