A Lesson in Hope: From my Dog

My smallest dog is on a diet, and she's not happy about it.

But it had to be done.  At the last trip to the vet, she was very, very overweight.  Borderline obese.

One too many table scraps and...

Being dominant around the food bowl eating all she could to prevent one of our other dogs to eat led to an intervention.

No more table scraps, and dogs get fed separately. 

Aiko now only gets 1 and 1/2 cups of dog food per day, and she thinks we are trying to starve her.

And so, she lives in hope.

Literally.

Whenever my wife, or my kids, or I am in the kitchen getting a bite to eat, Aiko follows us around looking at each of us longingly.

She is waiting.

She is hoping.

That we will drop a morsel of food or that she can snatch a bite out of an unsuspecting child's hand. 

Never mind the occurance is rare.  Never mind that it may happen once a month.  She's going to be there when the food drops so she can enjoy every morsel of it.  (I'd love to say she would savor it, but that'd be a lie.  She gobbles the stuff down, so I don't see how she could even taste it.)

I don't have to wonder where that dog is at when I am in the kitchen.  I know she is right there.  Waiting and hoping.

Do we have such hope in our Heavenly Father?

When things seem to be going rough and we feel like we are being starved: do we walk around, expectantly, waiting and hoping for a Word from God?  Do we constantly watch and move where we know the morsels will be dropped? 

Or do we mope around?  Do we stew in our hunger?  In our thirst?  Do we just sit there, or do we get up, go where the food is, and wander around until we have something to grab onto?  Do we become disappointed and give up?  Or do we continue to move and wait living in perpetual hope.

Yeah, I know, something about this just doesn't quite gel with the whole Lutheran understanding of the faith.  The analogy isn't perfect, but I wonder sometimes.

I truly do.