THE SPIRIT IN YOU
I have never been the classic athlete; however, I have been a competitor. Growing up, I “showed” my dog, Moe, competitively. While we competed in several events, my animal excelled in the agility competition. Agility is when the dog runs through a timed obstacle course. Obstacles typically include jumps, hoops, the teeter totter, and a closed tunnel. This event is scored by the number of correct obstacles the dog completes combined with the time it takes him/ her to complete them; the goal is to end the course with no missed obstacles and a quick time. Over the years, I showed my dog, he has won numerous times and was disqualified on a technicality a handful of times. I will never forget the first time I entered him in the dog competitions and it taught me lessons that I still use today. It was a warm June morning. We had been competing all weekend and this was the last day of the show. The division that we were classified in was the first part of the day. We practiced before our agility trial and Moe was doing fantastic. He was listening to me, had energy, and from my stand point, I thought we were going to do well as a team. It was finally time for us to enter the ring and Moe continued to have the energy that he needed to succeed in the competition. We began the course and Moe was doing great. He was doing a doggy sprint and flying over the first few obstacles. We arrive at the third obstacle which was the tunnel, his favorite part of this agility course. I ran to the side of tunnel where he should have been exiting and he did not come out. I yell out his name, clap my hands, and did everything that I could have done to convince him to come out but he stayed. I had no idea
"I found my boy with tired eyes trying to take a nap. In fact, I woke him up when I entered the tunnel. "
what I should do and looked at the judge. The judge told me to crawl into the tunnel and pull him out. What did I find when I went in there? I found my boy with tired eyes trying to take a nap. In fact, I woke him up when I entered the tunnel.
The first lesson that I learned was to make sure my animals receive proper sleep when doing a weekend filled with dog competitions. But the main lesson I took away from that moment was that as believers, we tend to start obstacles with energy, and fire for the Lord but then at some point, we end with the negative emotions of life. In the beginning, we are excited to complete obstacles for a reward and then we become tired and instead of finding the energy to press on, we stop with the intention of not continuing. After we finished (and were disqualified) from the morning agility trial, we had another competition in the afternoon. My dog took a long nap in his kennel and a few hours later, we entered the show ring again. This time Moe was prepared and he came home with a prize. If we as believers took the initiative to continue to take steps to keep the energy needed to win the race, where would the church be as a whole?
My days as a dog handler are over for now and I am on different journeys. Recently I have been convicted about my thought process when it comes to