Yard Work, Halloween and A Lost Dog

Thursday I told my friend that I don’t feel able to continue taking care of his yard on top of my own. I hated to do this because I hated to admit that I’m feeling old and weak. It was an admission of defeat.

God willing, I’ll keep working at it till the end of June to give him time to hire a yardman or make other arrangements, but I just don’t feel I can keep it up.

Of course, he said I can keep borrowing his mower and tools even though I’m not helping with his yard.

As I edged his lawn and my own, I got to thinking about Halloween (See October blog archives if you’re interested).

Ginny and I gave out huge packets of goodies to the kids and among the treasures were little comic books and I kept thinking about the story in one of these:

A man owned a little dog which he loved.

He was nuts about this dog. He fed it and gave it water. He fenced in his backyard garden and placed the dog there to live.

He told the dog, “Stay”.

Every evening the man came to the garden and played fetch-the-stick with his dog. He walked with his dog. He talked with it. He doted on it.

One day the dog wiggled out under the fence.

Out of bounds, the dog wandered hostile city streets. It wallowed in filth. It ate garbage right out of the cans. It slept in the gutters. It ran with other dogs.

The dog catcher came. He cast a net over the dog. He lassoed a noose around it’s neck and dragged it into a barren steel cage. He took it to the dog pound.

Dogs only stay locked in the pound a few short days before being shoved into the gas chamber.

Destroyed forever.

The owner of the dog searched all over for it. He called its name. He went down alleys and dark places seeking his own. He went to all the low places dogs go.

He even went to the dog pound.

To rescue his own dog from that gas chamber, he paid the penalty.

He paid a high price to redeem his own dog.

He took the dog he owned in the first place, the dog he had bought back from the edge of destruction, the dog he loved — and he returned it to the garden.

The Halloween comic reminds me that in his first letter St. Peter says that we were not redeemed with mere silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ.

Something to think about, isn’t it?