Dog Lover's Devotional by Katherine Anne Douglas

Author:Katherine Anne Douglas [Douglas, Katherine A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-62029-080-4
Publisher: Barbour Publishing, Inc.
Published: 2012-04-20T04:00:00+00:00

When you repent of sin before God today, don’t be like Lucy, who makes a show of being sorry. Be genuine. God stands ready to forgive the person who has “a broken and contrite heart” (Psalm 51:17).

Kontou and Tara

The blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.

1 JOHN 1:7 KJV

Kontou and Tara, two Alaskan malamutes with a propensity for getting into trouble, had done it again. They had run off to do some exploring. Now Char and Ed had the unenviable task of tracking from farm to farm to find their two rascals.

Being the male, Kontou is bigger than Tara. He’s usually the ringleader when it comes to making a mess or getting into a fix. One Christmas, Char stepped out of the kitchen momentarily while the turkey cooled a bit. The turkey had no time to cool. Kontou pulled it off the counter, awarding Tara one drumstick while he devoured the rest.

On another occasion, Kontou and Tara had hitched a ride in the back of a stranger’s pickup only to end up in a town miles from their home. They almost found themselves in two new homes, separated for good. This time the search was, fortunately, much shorter than the earlier one. Char and Ed came home after being unsuccessful in locating the two runaways, but soon a man in a sports car approached.

“You the folks looking for some dogs?” he asked.

Char answered affirmatively.

“Well, they’re at my place,” he said. “You’re gonna have to come and get ’em. I wasn’t about to put ’em in my car. They’re in my pigsty.”

Char and Ed almost drowned Kontou and Tara in tomato juice. But the stench didn’t wash out that easily. The two miscreants were bundled in blankets and hauled home. It would be some time and a lot of suds and water before their dogs didn’t smell like pigs.

In Jude, some of scripture’s most severe words are leveled against those who are “godless men, who change the grace of our God into a license for immorality and deny Jesus Christ our only Sovereign and Lord” (Jude 4). Ungodly leaders have been duping and misleading people for centuries. For those who fall under their influence, we are to show mercy, even while we hate “the clothing stained by corrupted flesh” (verse 23). God never minces words when it comes to the defiling effects of sin.

Like Kontou and Tara, covered with the filth and stench of the pigpen, we are stained and dirty with sin. Sin’s stain and stench, both on us and in us, cannot be washed away by our actions or merit. Only Jesus’ blood can cleanse us.

Once we confess our sin, God “is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9). It is the blood of Christ that effects our cleansing (1:7). In contrast to the infiltrators mentioned in Jude’s letter, John is shown those “who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb” (Revelation 7:14).

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