Walking with Dog: What Man's Best Friend Can Teach Us About God

by Tom Vint

Overview

Dogs are referred to as "man's best friend." They love their masters unconditionally, no matter how the master behaves. Even if the master has flaws, a dog will still show love and devotion. They are forgiving, compassionate, and attentive, and what do they ask in return? To be loved--simply, honestly, all a dog wants is to be loved. So what do dogs have to do with God? More than you might think!

In Walking with Dog, Labrador enthusiast and dog lover Tom Vint provides an enlightening view of our loving housemates. He asks the question: What if God built human relationships with dogs as mirrors of God's relationship with His people? After all, God loves us unconditionally. God is willing to forgive our flaws. God is always attentive, and He only asks for our love in return.

As Christians, we were all puppies once. We all had need of training and guidance in the ways of our Master. We were never perfect; we will never be perfect. Yet God gives us loving discipline to keep us on the right path, just as we do with our furry friends. There are heartwarming correlations between God and dogs, and Christian dog owners will relate. Dogs may be man's best friends, but we are God's best friends, and He is waiting to open His arms and love us.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781450290777
Publisher:	iUniverse, Incorporated
Publication date:	06/24/2011
Pages:	91
Sales rank:	705,180
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.22(d)

Read an Excerpt

Walking with Dog

What Man's Best Friend Can Teach Us about God

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By Tom Vint

iUniverse, Inc.

Copyright © 2011 Tom Vint
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4502-9077-7

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Chapter One

In The Beginning

Where does a great story begin? We all have stories to tell. I have become a believer that God puts us in different places in this world to live a story, figure out how He became involved in it all, and finally to share all that with others. It is called our living witness. It is our life. We all have such a story—some of us just take a lot longer to figure it out. Some of us take longer still to get to the point where we can begin to share it with others.

During the 1970s, I was an outdoor writer for the Lincoln, Nebraska, newspapers. Not long out of college and just finished with a two-year stint in the military, my young wife and I settled into our new life just a few hours from our native home in central Iowa.

As an outdoor writer, I had opportunities to interview and spend time with a number of people in the outdoor-recreation world. Outdoor writers write about the great outdoors—hunting, fishing, camping, and the like. It is a pretty nice job most of the time. My job basically allowed me to do things most people have to take vacations to enjoy. I was paid for it. Despite the facts that I was always looking for a story and generally carrying around bulky cameras for illustrations, it was a lot of fun to write about people enjoying the out-of-doors. I made a lot of friends over those years.

Of particular fascination to me were the field-trial-dog trainers and what they could do with their dogs. It amazed me how those retrieving dogs could be directed by a whistle and hand signals from what seemed to be hundreds of yards away. It was delightful to watch the dogs work the air with their gifted noses to help guide them to a targeted bird. It impressed me greatly how the dogs did all this with joy in bringing the prize back to their masters. The dogs' tails were up and wagging with their delight in doing just what they were born to do. I enjoyed writing those stories about men and women and their dogs. I dreamed of the day when I could have a dog of my own, a dog like those.

When my wife and I moved to Lincoln, we lived in a small two-bedroom duplex owned by a wonderful couple who took pity on us. They could relate to our just coming out of the military with no money in our pockets. They had done the same thing themselves a few years earlier. They also apparently thought we'd be good neighbors, which was important since they lived in the other side of their tandem home. They were delightful people with two young daughters. One of their rules was no pets, but that didn't bother us because we didn't have one–at least not yet.

Several months into the new job, I went to lunch with a friend and a couple of sales representatives for a number of outdoor sporting goods products. During our conversations on a number of subjects, one of those gentlemen, Don Bader, mentioned something about field trialing his Labrador retrievers. He had been raising Labs and apparently had some very good ones. Several had earned field-champion status for winning field trials. It was a measuring stick for top-quality dogs. Good bloodlines are very valuable.

It caught my interest and drew us into a lengthy conversation on the rewards of well-bred dogs, training techniques, abilities of the dogs to do so many things, and just about everything else related to dogs. In my writings, I had witnessed the attributes of many gundog breeds. I compared all the things I desired in a dog—versatility in the ability to hunt many types of birds and in various conditions. I also wanted a dog that would be great for the family my wife and I had not yet started. I came to the conclusion that a Labrador retriever would best fit all the things I wanted in a good dog when I was ready to get one.

It is a marvelous breed—smart, eager to please, trainable, versatile, and a wonderful family and service dog. Labs seem to have it all. I had read up on many breeds I thought would fit the versatility I desired. I found many breeds that have great characteristics, and I certainly don't want to diminish the joy any of them can bring an owner, but a Lab, I decided, was the one I wanted.

During my conversation with Don, I mentioned something about how I would love to try training such a dog someday. I had heard how much easier it was to train a dog when it came from good bloodlines. My new friend confirmed that paying for better breeding provides dividends in easier training. He noted that field-trial dogs, much like seeing-eye dogs, are bred for desired traits such as temperament, scenting ability, trainability, speed, size, and so on. Yes, the Labrador is a great breed. Okay, now I really wanted one.

Don said one of his dogs was about to have a litter of pups and asked if I would like one.

I was momentarily speechless. The thought of owning such an animal was a great temptation. When I regained my composure, however, I tried to explain that it would be wonderful, but it was not in our family budget to feed a pet, let alone buy a purebred dog with such good breeding.

Don said that wasn't a problem, but I continued to graciously decline. My wife and I were still trying to put enough money together to buy furniture for our home. In truth, it was embarrassing to tell Don just how poor we were. We really had come out of the military without any money. As much as I would have loved a dog, it wasn't the time. We couldn't afford one.

We left the restaurant and, other than an occasional daydream of such a dog, I didn't think much more about the conversation. A few months later, however, there came a call from the Lincoln Airport baggage department. I had a package to pick up, and it needed to be picked up soon. I had no idea what the clerk was talking about. We had not ordered anything from anybody. He said there was a little dog kennel there, and it had my name on it. It wasn't empty. We needed to pick up our package. When I asked where it came from, the clerk said, "St. Louis, from a Don Bader."

I called my wife and said we needed to run out to the airport. We had only one car, and she had it at her new job as a bank teller. We didn't know what to expect when we arrived to get the package, other than the obvious—the little dog kennel likely housed a little dog.

My wife was not a dog person. Her family had cats. She wasn't ready for a pet, and we had no clue about where it was going to stay. Remember the no-pet stipulation at the duplex?

When we arrived at the baggage claim, we were directed to the small kennel in the back. We bent down and opened the door of our package. There she was—a black shadow plastered against the back of this frightening cage, shaking in fear, and uncertain about what had just happened to her world. Don had sent us one of his Labradors. My wife pulled the trembling pup out of the kennel and wrapped her in her arms. She cuddled the new baby all the way home. A bond was formed instantly. How can you not fall in love with a little Lab puppy with those big "cow" eyes and a desire to shower you with kisses for rescuing her from the great unknown?

We really didn't know what to do. I had to call Don to say that I'd have to send her back. Besides, we couldn't afford to buy a dog like this. He said something to the effect that he "wouldn't take her back. You can't afford the shipping costs, for one thing. Besides, she was a gift, and the pedigree papers are in the mail. She has championship field-trial bloodlines. This is a valuable little puppy. Enjoy your first real dog."

That was our beginning with Boo Boo. The name was significant from the standpoint that her arrival was a "boo boo" for us, at least right then. And we still had the no-pet rule to face when we arrived home.

After a little explanation that this was not really our doing, our landlords let us bring the puppy home with the understanding that we'd find someplace else for her quickly. Boo was a happy puppy, and she was doing fine in her new surroundings until the landlord, his wife, and their two young children came home from a little outing a few days later. I was playing with the pup in the yard when the neighbors and their two little girls arrived. Boo saw the little three-year-old girl, who let out a happy shriek at seeing the puppy. Boo raced to greet her ... but didn't stop.

This ten-week-old puppy leaped into what she perceived as "waiting" arms, and steamrolled the poor little girl. The happy shriek turned into one of terror. It was more crying out in surprise than injury, but the deed was done. Boo deflated at the little girl's feet. The puppy recognized she had done something terribly wrong. She never jumped on a child after that day, but the pup now had to go somewhere else immediately. That was the landlord's order.

Some coworker friends at the newspaper agreed to take Boo for a little while until we figured something out. They had a nice house, a big garage, a large backyard, and all the things a puppy could use. None of us realized, however, how a free-running, ten-week-old Labrador puppy could rearrange a garage when left unattended. In a matter of days, we were looking at replacing a piece of drywall she had tried to dig through and the insulating strip that formerly graced the bottom of the garage door.

Boo didn't like to be left alone, and she was digging her way out to find her people. We had not yet learned that putting a puppy in a kennel when left unattended for a few hours is much safer for the puppy and for its environment. It also could save a lot of time when you don't have to take inventory of things potentially digested that could be dangerous for a pup. Like new parents with a first baby, we had a lot to learn about raising our first real dog.

Boo led us to quickly act on buying a house near our duplex. We had watched a small house come on the market and had some interest in it prior to the arrival of the pup. The house sold quickly and we were disappointed we had missed out. Within days, however, it came back on the market. The first deal apparently fell through. We put in an offer, and miraculously found financing to carry the entire cost of the $17,000 purchase. It wasn't a really expensive house, even by standards of that day, but it met our needs at the time. We could move in by month's end. Our first dog led us to buy our first house, a small two-bedroom home with a large fenced backyard. It was some beginning.

As we look back now more than three decades later, we realize how much a hand God must have had in all that. He brought us this special little dog—which didn't stay little long, and led us to buy our first home with really wonderful neighbors. And they liked our puppy, too. How could you not? Boo Boo was a delight for all of us. She was a heart-warmer, such a loving puppy that the neighbors had to like us so they could spend more time with her. I'd like to think we were good people, but we had this puppy with big brown eyes and a ready wag to her tail any time somebody came around. She invited anyone to pet her. It was as if God had provided a happy little icebreaker that opened doors of friendship for those near us.

Just Walking with You

For those of us who have been in love with someone, there is a period of time, often early in the relationship, when you can't get enough of the other person. You want to be around them all the time. You can talk to them for hours. You find pleasure just to look at them or hear the sound of their voice.

So it is with a good dog. However, unlike most of our human relationships, the Labs I have had never seemed to lose that feeling of wanting to be with us. I find that amazing sometimes when I know I am not in the best of moods and won't be the best of company. Those four-legged creatures still want to be around us. My wife and kids might not want to share my time and space, but the dogs do. I wish more of us could be wired like that.

There was a great cartoon I clipped out once to remind me of those days when I, like the little girl in the comic, wanted to post a sign that said, "Leave me alone. Don't talk to me. I'm in a rotten mood." The girl's dog came up to the chair where she was sulking, and when she looked up to see him, the dog lathered her with several big, wet kisses. The last frame of the cartoon had the dog curled up in the little girl's lap. Her rotten mood had disappeared. There is something about big, wet kisses that tend to soften even a hardened heart.

Boo had such a great personality. She was so eager to learn and be with us that it was hard to go anywhere without her. I began reading as many dog-training books as I could find. One of the best I ever picked up was Hey, Pup, Fetch It Up by Bill Tarrant. One of the things he mentioned about training the best dogs was spending a lot of time with them. That wasn't too tough to do with Boo Boo.

We had a big, old Chevy Impala, and her favorite place to ride was in the back window. It wasn't a big deal when she was a pup, but, as I mentioned, she didn't stay small for long.

Boo was what I learned later to be a larger strain of Labrador believed to have been bred in Newfoundland. Those Labs tend to be taller, generally thinner, and more energetic than the shorter, more docile strain of Labs bred for fishing boat use and later refined for hunting and retrieving by English breeders.

Boo grew quickly and soon nearly filled the back window of that rather substantial car. She drew a lot of double takes from fellow motorists; most initially thought she was just a really big bobbing-head stuffed animal that was popular in those days. People would pass, honk, and wave to us. They would offer a big smile while shaking their heads and pointing to the back window.

Boo also learned quickly to work the system. She was just as smart as she was friendly. Georgie had never owned a dog during the time I knew her, at least not a housedog. She was in agreement with my dad, who said dogs were supposed to be outside animals, but then he raised us and our childhood dogs on an acreage. There was a lot of room to be outside.

What I wanted as my training goal, however, was to prove to people that a great hunting dog also could be a great indoor dog and family pet. I always felt dogs were meant to be companions. It pained me to think of wasting all of their love in an outside kennel. Dogs, in my opinion, are meant to be with us.

At my wife's demand, Boo first was limited to the basement of our little home. The basement steps came up to the kitchen, and Boo would lie on the top step with her head on the tile floor. Her sad eyes would follow my wife's every move while she worked in the kitchen. The pup would occasionally offer a deep sigh or a quiet whimper to softly share her displeasure at being kept so far away from her "parents." Apparently, six feet was a lot of separation. We didn't have a very large kitchen.

"Okay, it's all right for her to be in the kitchen, but not on the carpet." Cute puppies can melt hearts.

Boo wasn't quite satisfied with just the kitchen, either. After all, we didn't spend all of our time there. She would sleep at the edge of the kitchen tile floor and somehow could "magically" stretch in mid-nap. Remarkably, she would end up on the carpet. We'd catch her and push her back to the tile. No matter how much correction or nudging back off the carpet, she would always go back to fake her nap, stretch, and there she was. Even having her very own rug didn't matter; there was even more deep sighing and whimpering.

"Okay, she can come in on the carpet." Boo was one happy young dog, curled up at our feet with no more problems in the world. The sighs and whimpers were exchanged for a regular happy tail thump on the carpeted floor next to where one of us was sitting.

The reality was that she wanted to be with us and keep us in her sight. It should be no surprise that such a gregarious pack animal wants to have company. She, and every other dog we've had, had the same need, the same want. They wanted to be close to the ones they love.

God created us for relationships, and good dogs are reminders of that very point. They are pack animals and relish life in a crowd. They love family—if they can touch you, it's even better.

(Continues...)

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Excerpted from Walking with Dog by Tom Vint Copyright © 2011 by Tom Vint. Excerpted by permission of iUniverse, Inc.. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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Table of Contents

Contents

Preface....................vii
Chapter One: In the Beginning....................1
Chapter Two: Just Walking with You....................9
Chapter Three: Walking to Know You More....................21
Chapter Four: Walking with Angels....................31
Chapter Five: Walking in Joy....................41
Chapter Six: Walking the Talk....................47
Chapter Seven: The Consistent Walk....................59
Chapter Eight: Walking in Rebellion....................65
Chapter Nine: Walking in Respect....................71
Chapter Ten: Walking in Love....................77
Chapter Eleven: When the Walk is Over....................83