Doggy Daycare Soap Opera

My drive to work is an hour. This gives me an hour to think, to pray and to try to stay awake. I listen to Air1, a Christian music station that almost gives in to static the closer I get to home in the afternoons. But in the mornings, the signal gets stronger the closer I get to work.

Little Bit is not a morning dog

One morning on my way to work, I was fighting sleep when I heard a familiar song on the radio. I took a drink of coffee and turned up the volume. It was for KING & COUNTRY’s song The Proof of Your Love. (See Video Here) As you may notice, the title of this blog is inspired by this song. When I began this blog before I went to Uganda (5 years ago! Has it really been that long?) I wanted my trip to be nothing about me but completely about showing God’s love to His people. When I got there, I realized that the people were God’s proof of His love towards me. But that’s for another blog post.

Jeeves!

When I started my job, I knew that I would be working with dogs. I work at BrownDog Lodge in Germantown and have been there since October 2016. BrownDog Lodge is a luxury hotel, daycare and spa for your canine companions from the tiniest toy poodle that weighs 3 pounds to the largest Great Dane who comes up to my chest when he’s standing on all fours beside me. I LOVE working daycare. I love watching the dogs interact with each other. I love seeing all the various breeds and mixes of breeds that fill the three daycares (small, medium and large).

The "Three Tinies": Pacer, Jack and Honey

A common scene in the soap opera of Doggy Daycare is an older dog is napping in the sun, minding her own business when a younger dog walks up and wants to play. This always involves A Lot of barking. Constant. Loud. Barking. I usually scold the younger dog a couple of times and sometimes, it works. But I know that when the younger dog won’t listen to me, he will for sure listen to the older dog. This request is always a quick jump to all fours, followed by a short, stern bark that immediately tells the other dog to “Back off!” This is an effective method and the younger dog sulks away while the victorious, older dog goes back to napping.

Tonka is usually barking at Graham

We all have been in these types of situations. No, you were probably not an old dog, laying in the sun, napping in doggy daycare. But we all have had someone just annoy us to no end. They rub us the wrong way. They give us the heebie jeebies. And for some reason we just don’t like them.

But what if that person is here to shape you? To make you better? To mold you into the person God wants you to be?

I recently looked up this verse and realized how it applies to me almost daily.

“As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.”

Proverbs 27:17

To tie this all together, to be The Proof of His Love, we have to let ourselves be sharpened by others. Iron is not sharpened when both pieces are going the same. They have to go in opposite directions for both to achieve what is needed. So the next time there’s a younger dog barking at you during your naptime, realize that it’s for a reason you may not understand at the moment, but in God’s time.

“Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time.” 1 Peter 5:6

Crosby in his dapper bowtie