I have three dogs. Well, technically, I have one dog and each of my children has a dog…which means I have three dogs. I am not a dog person. Really, I am not a pet person. My husband, however, loves dogs and insists on having one. I made a comment years ago that if I ever got a dog, I would like a mastiff. They seemed really chill, although they slobbered a lot. My husband preferred pit bulls. Eleven years ago, a guy walked into my sister’s yard with a box full of put bull/mastiff mix puppies and my husband knew this was his golden opportunity. It was the perfect compromise! He purchased a puppy and brought it home – with no notice. I am a planner, I like to research and process, so it was a bit of a shock when he walked into the house with a puppy in his arms. It didn’t take long for me to warm up to that cuddly little fella. Before the night was over I told him this was my dog, he would need to get his own. I named him Billy and took him everywhere I went. The honeymoon phase didn’t last long – Billy liked shoes. To be more accurate, he liked shoe. He loved to chew one of each of my shoes, never two of the same pair. When I cooked bacon, he begged at my feet, which drove me nuts. I would holler “Get out of my kitchen,” and wave my hand to usher him out. With training, time, and a lot of love, Billy became the best dog I have ever encountered. He never begs, he is gentle, protective, and he knows his place. My husband says he was my first baby, but when I had my son a year later he became a dog. There is some truth to that statement.
When my kids begged me for puppies for Christmas, I dismissed their pleas for months. I was adamant – we were NOT getting another dog. Billy was an exceptional dog, but I was fairly certain that he was one of a kind, and that any other dog we got would not be as good as him. But I am a mom, and they wore me out. And I got them each a puppy for Christmas. What was I thinking? I don’t even like dogs!
I say all of that to say this: I was a dog.
Then came she and worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me. But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children’s bread, and to cast it to dogs. And she said, Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters’ table.
Matthew 15:25-27
I have related to this woman for my entire life. My mother and father split when I was very young, and we moved a lot. For awhile we lived with my grandmother. She was a good woman, and she loved us…but I always knew I was living in her house. She never made me feel that way, I just knew….my place. Years later my mom met a man she would live with for years, and we moved into his house. I moved into his daughter’s room. And I felt out of place. So out of place I moved out to the garage and slept there. I never felt like I belonged, and I always knew my place. When I became an adult, I felt like I was no good. Really, I had fallen short in every aspect of my life. I became an addict and an alcoholic – things I promised myself I would never do. When I first came to Jesus, I was a dog. I knew my place. I knew I wasn’t worthy of anything He had to offer, but I wanted everything He had to offer, nonetheless. It’s like Billy when I cook bacon – he knows it’s not for him, but he can’t help drool and hope that he might get a crumb, and sometimes he does. I love him, but I want to make sure that my kids, my family get their fill of bacon before I give Billy any. Today, my husband was peeling potatoes in the kitchen and one of the new puppies came in and started sniffing. Wait – I know I lost some of you there – yes, you read that right. My husband was in the kitchen peeling potatoes. He is an amazing guy, and he loves me, and I needed fifteen pounds of potatoes peeled. I try to remember to thank God for him every day, he truly is a gift. Anyway, there he was sitting on the bench peeling potatoes and the puppy came in sniffing the peels. “No, those aren’t for you, get out of the kitchen,” my husband said. I turned around to see what was happening and it occurred to me that the dog just wanted the peel, just the scraps that were going into the trash anyway. Had my daughter walked in and asked her daddy for a potato peel out of the trash, he would have said “No, honey. But if you grab one of those potatoes we can dice it up and make some fried potatoes.” They would have added some salt and pepper and he would have made her a meal. Standing there in the kitchen I heard that still, small voice. Jesus never meant for me to stay there, to be a dog.
And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.
2 Corinthians 6:18
He wants to be my father, my Lord, he desires a relationship with me. He is not all about commands and putting me in my place. It is a different perspective – dog vs. daughter. To be quite honest – I don’t know what that looks like, I never had a father. I know my dad, I even love my dad, but he has never been able to be a father to me. I don’t know what it is to run into my daddy’s arms when I want to feel safe, or to know that my father loves me so much that he would do anything to see me smile. I see it in my daughter’s relationship with her father, and few things bring me greater joy! But it has been hard for me to make the transition from dog to daughter. Jesus has offered me a seat at the table, a chance to commune with him, to walk with him in the garden in the cool of the day. Me, a broken little girl; an alcoholic, addict who walked away. But that isn’t me anymore and I cannot let that past define me anymore. I was all of those things and they helped shape who I am, but who I am now isn’t any of those things. In all of this pain and disease that has plagued my body, I have begged for healing…just like that dog begging for the potato peel. I wanted the scrap, but I knew it wasn’t meant for me. I shyly approached, timidly asked for healing. I pleaded with God to take the pain, or to take the disease. But I never thought He would…because I was a dog, unworthy of the peel, let alone the meal.
The thought first occurred to me two weeks ago that I needed to make the transition from dog to daughter. Four days ago I started to write this post. And tonight, in a way that only God can do, He brought it all together for me. In the middle of the Sunday School lesson I was teaching, my pastor read the passage from Matthew chapter fifteen and I knew God was about to do something special. I shifted from my lesson and began to speak about how God had been dealing with me about that very passage of scripture. How I had felt unworthy my whole life and I wanted to take my seat at the table.
And then, as thought it were planned, my nephew began to sing “Raise a Hallelujah,” and when he spoke the words “I raise a hallelujah, louder than the unbelief,” I knew that’s what I had to do. I had to cry out to my Father, and ask for Him to heal me, believing that he would. I know, that seems elementary to some, but for a girl who has spent her whole life living like a dog, that is foreign to me.
I am not sure exactly what happened tonight, but I know that something shifted. All I could think as I prayed was “It is finished.” When a friend told me after church that she had a vision of a woman crawling with a heavy load on her back, and she felt to tell me that the load was gone, it was further confirmation. Tonight, I took a seat at the table.
Uncommonly Common Mom 