Lesson

What?!? You wanted this shoe?…

Yellow Labrador Retriever pup, 8 weeks old, chewing a child's shoe

At one point in each of their lives, all of our dogs chewed shoes. They didn’t just chew the shoe. They would often drag it outside, in the middle of the night, so that if they didn’t manage to totally destroy the shoe, they forced the owner of the shoe to hunt it down and if they found it, wear a dew sodden shoe. By repetition our dogs eventually learn that the word, “NO!” meant they were either doing something wrong, or about to. And by observation I learned that if I didn’t tell then during or before they did the deed, they wouldn’t associate it with the deed. So, eventually, they got that they weren’t to chew on shoes.

I suspect that when we get to heaven, we’ll see a lot of things that would have happened, had we made better choices. We will see plans that could have accomplished great things, that we personally spoiled by ignoring the importance of things God clearly demonstrated should have been respected. Burt for now, it’s important to pay attention to things God may be preparing, and not mess them up for our temporary amusement.

—Danny

“For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I.”—Romans 7:15