Sometimes, dogs like to go around marking their territory. They like to pee all over the place, letting the other dogs and animals know that this area or object belongs to them. As humans, if we don’t see it being done, we don’t know they marked that area. Our noses aren’t strong enough to pick up the scent and we can’t see it. Well, for most of the year, at least. In winter, it’s pretty easy. Just look for the yellow snow(but don’t eat it!)
Sometimes, it can get pretty annoying. We think about dogs marking trees, areas of grass, park benches, etc…However, when I used to be a dog trainer in 2007, my dog, Heinz (like the brand of Ketchup) had his cage next to where I put my shoes. Yeah, you know what I’m getting at. That stupid dog walked out of its cage, casually lifted its leg and used my shoes as target practice!
I think its ok to say that I wanted to kill him. Especially since Heinz kept going and going. It was seriously like a hose had been turned on! I tried pulling him by the collar and received a menacing growl so I quickly let go and sadly watched my shoes being ruined :/ If dogs could smile or laugh, I’m pretty sure he was doing both that very minute. Funny guy.
I trained that dog to sit. Trained him to stay. Come. Down. Heel. Walk up a steep set of stairs. Go “potty” in a designated area. “Seal the deal” with a pawshake. Heinz learned all that fairly quickly and I had no problem getting him to do those things. The one thing I could never train him to do was to stop marking his territory.
Everywhere I turned that dumb dog was lifting his leg. I admit, a few times it was a bit hilarious. Like the time Heinz lifted his leg on someone else’s female dog and peed all over it. That trainer wasn’t too happy with me afterward, but I think it was worth it. I wonder what would happen if instead of us men buying expensive rings and proposing to a woman, we just lifted our legs….. “You’re mine now, babe.”
I think it’s time that we began to mark our territory. I think it’s time to begin making it known what is ours. At training camp, we were taught that we need to declare who we were in God. Declare out loud what God had told us; who God had made us. At any random time of day, while walking to lunch, or back to our tents or place of residence for that night, we might have heard screaming in the woods:
“I AM A SON OF GOD!’’
“I AM LOVED BY HIM!”
My teammate, Leah Malone (featured racer, go Team Monarch!) said it well, “these world race people are crazy!” We are, but I’m fine with that. I’m fine with being crazy as long as I step into a new place in God by making yellow snow.
However, we’ve been trained to believe that we must follow the order of things. That we must be like everyone else or it’s weird.
Too often we let someone tell us that we can’t do this or that and we aren’t this type of person and will never be that type of person and we aren’t who we think we are and we aren’t going here or there with our lives and and and… Too often, people tell us that what we’re doing is impossible. We need to begin closing our ears to what we can’t do and who we aren’t going to be and begin opening them to what we can do and who we are going to be!
Let me go against the grain-nothing is impossible!
We need to mark our territory. We need to make a bunch of yellow snow and let everyone know(ourselves, most importantly) that words won’t put us down. We have the right to declare who we are in God and where we are going in God. We have the right because GOD gave us that right. If you argue with me, you might win. I usually lose arguments anyway. But you can’t argue with God. You can’t look God in the face and tell Him that He’s wrong.
God told me that I’m going on this race. God told me that He’s going to change me. God told me that I’m going to help the nations. God told me that I am somebody and I believe it and I declare it and I’m marking my territory today. There’s no argument on this. The end.
