As I am closing up my time in Honduras I wanted to talk a little bit about a dog. As many of you know, I love dogs. Big, small, and all those in between. I love dogs. This didn’t stop when I arrived in Urraco Pueblo, however, it changed the way I interacted with them at first. You know the dogs in the United States are usually pets; clean and comfortable with people, however, the dogs in Honduras are unpredictable; usually strays, have bugs, and nervous around people. This sets the stage for the rest of my blog.
The day after we arrived in our new home we went to Pastor Rony and Pastora’s house for lunch (a daily walk and occasion). Outside their house and restaurant was a dog. He looked like many of the other strays that we had seen in our short time in Honduras: skinny, a mutt, tired eyes. I immediately asked if the dog belonged to the Pastor. He laughed and responded saying that the dog was no one’s pet but they fed him their scraps so that’s why he loitered around their house. From then on, I made it my mission to become his friend. I named him “Bugs” (or “Beichos” = Spanish for Bugs) because he had fleas and little bugs on him at all times. The mission succeeded quickly because as long as you gave him some scraps and paid attention to him a little bit; he fell in love. Bugs would welcome us to the Pastor’s house, walk us back to the church where we were living as our protector, join me for runs in the morning (until he became tired!), and always seemed to be around to help when I needed an emotional uplift. While this made me super happy, especially after finding out my pup at home had passed at the end of week one, not everyone was too excited about having Bugs around. If he came into the house while we were eating or hanging out at the house he was shooed out and scolded, other dogs frequently would attack him to try and get some scraps for themselves, and team members would talk about how he smelled or was annoying.
This has given me a visual representation of our relationship with Jesus. Often when things get dirty or messy, much as Bugs was smelly and buggy, with our relationship with Jesus the impulse is to shoo him away. We immediately want to distance ourselves from the messiness because it doesn’t seem quite worth it to continue to trust someone who isn’t appealing to us. But the thing that amazes me most about the love of Jesus is that He is loyal. He is persistent. His faithfulness to us is unfailing. No matter how many times we shoo Him away, run away from Him, tell Him that we don’t love Him, or turn our backs Jesus still runs after us. He still walks with us and tries to protect us from temptations, sins, guilt, and shame. He greets us with open arms much as Bugs would greet us with a wagging tail. Through Bugs, I was able to see Jesus. Through Bugs, I was able to fully learn how to be loyal, faithful, and persistent with people I can about just as Jesus is for us.
Three weeks ago, I wouldn’t have thought that I would be writing a blog about a dog and how Jesus was fully seen in him. With that being said, I really hope that this blog was able to impact the way you can see Jesus in small things, such as a dog. Jesus is everywhere if you just dig a little deeper and see the details. As always, feel free to reach out to me via email ([email protected]) if you have any questions or just want to chat. I only have WiFi once or twice a week but I will be sure to respond as soon as possible!
See you next week!
Elisabeth Sage
