Pastor Paul’s Passages Paul Ragle

by PAUL RAGLE

We love our pets...

and receive much love in return.

Many parents introduce a pet into their home to teach their children responsibility for the care and feeding of the animal. Stewardship of a pet is certainly consistent with a variety of biblical principles children do well to learn. Proverbs 12:10 teaches “The righteous know the needs of their animals…” Children may learn that when a family’s pets are cared for, they provide companionship, amusement, and often unconditional love. But keeping a pet is a weighty responsibility-a child learns quite a lot about being created in God’s image as she/he loves and cares for a living animal.

As my children were growing up, they always knew and loved a variety of dogs, cats, goldfish and other creatures. (I think there might also have been a turtle and a gerbil, mouse or some sort of rodent.) As adults, all three of my kids have dogs or cats that are valued members of their families. But life with pets in a family can be an adventure.

All three of our children came into the world where our family already had a teacup poodle guardian named Charmagne. She saw herself as a second nurturing mother to all three of our babies. She would lie on the floor beside their cribs when they slept and would come to let Connee or me know whenever a baby awoke crying. When our cat had kittens, the mama cat often left her kittens in Charmagne’s care so she could go out to do her thing. Charmagne kept the kittens bathed and warm.

As our kids grew older, they received a new canine playmate. Her name was Noel, a silver and black Australian cow dog. Noel loved to play in the back yard with the kids and would nip their heals to herd them to where she wanted them to be. She would sing along with our family whenever we sang. She was also very protective. When I came home from a quad heart bypass surgery, Noel wouldn’t leave my side. She stayed right with me through my convalescence.

Two of the neighbor’s dogs had a habit of coming into our yard to do their business. Noel learned how to open the front door so she could chase them back home. Because of her aggressive protection, we were forced to rehome Noel. She went to live with a family who lived in the country with three or four Labrador Retrievers. Noel became a therapy dog and lived a long life of sharing love with humans.

So many pet stories I could tell. Shadow, our daughter’s black Lab had nine puppies on one Christmas Day. Shadow loved to climb the stockade fence and go roaming (which included taking a swim in the farm pond down the road). On one of my frequent neighborhood searches for Shadow on a very hot day, I found her in the neighbor’s fish pond with only her head sticking out of the water.

We love our pets and receive much love in return. n