Teaching my dog, Rory, has been teaching me. We have steadily been working on his ability to remain calm when seeing other dogs. This requires rewarding him for good behavior, and ignoring him and just hanging on when he starts pulling and lunging. Every week I see him improving. I also notice that if we run into too many dogs on a walk, or if there’s too much stimulation around him, he gets worse. He may have been behaving great at the beginning of the walk, but by the end, I’m dragging him along. Or, he’ll have a great day, and then the next day, be an overly excited and anxious pup.
Teaching him has been teaching me.
Growth is often a slow process. The results are not always readily visible. I cannot see from day to day how he is progressing….but I can certainly see it from last spring! Steady small steps with the expectation that there will be bad days, and overwhelming triggers, and a need to wait until calm returns.
Faith, as well as life, may be about the small steady steps, as much as the big ones. It will include the days when we forget who we are (child of God). It will include the days when there is too much stimulation – too many fears, too many anxieties, too many hurts. They are not too many for God, but we forget. And in our forgetfulness, we do what we wish we did not do. Or we stop altogether – impatient with our progress or stuck by some hurdle that has appeared in our way!
Yet, we are invited to return to the slow steady steps of the Spirit. Healing is sometimes slow and meandering. Faith is often filled with questions. Joy comes in the morning, but we may be awake at night for a while. The evidence may not yet be visible to us – how the Spirit is strengthening us, or how God is sheltering us, or how we truly are learning to lean on the secure foundation of Christ. But then we look back! And we see how far we’ve come.
May you follow Jesus, no turning back, and may your slow steady steps take you to a surprising place, people of Hope. May you be surprised by the abundance of growth all around you and in you. And may your growth be a testimony to the love and wonder of God.
Ask me next year how well Rory walks past dogs.
Peace,
Pastor Liz
Teaching him has been teaching me.
Growth is often a slow process. The results are not always readily visible. I cannot see from day to day how he is progressing….but I can certainly see it from last spring! Steady small steps with the expectation that there will be bad days, and overwhelming triggers, and a need to wait until calm returns.
Faith, as well as life, may be about the small steady steps, as much as the big ones. It will include the days when we forget who we are (child of God). It will include the days when there is too much stimulation – too many fears, too many anxieties, too many hurts. They are not too many for God, but we forget. And in our forgetfulness, we do what we wish we did not do. Or we stop altogether – impatient with our progress or stuck by some hurdle that has appeared in our way!
Yet, we are invited to return to the slow steady steps of the Spirit. Healing is sometimes slow and meandering. Faith is often filled with questions. Joy comes in the morning, but we may be awake at night for a while. The evidence may not yet be visible to us – how the Spirit is strengthening us, or how God is sheltering us, or how we truly are learning to lean on the secure foundation of Christ. But then we look back! And we see how far we’ve come.
May you follow Jesus, no turning back, and may your slow steady steps take you to a surprising place, people of Hope. May you be surprised by the abundance of growth all around you and in you. And may your growth be a testimony to the love and wonder of God.
Ask me next year how well Rory walks past dogs.
Peace,
Pastor Liz
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