Animals

Animals

Have you ever watched animals at the change of a season? Like, right now, my cat’s fur is getting thicker, the mice are roaming and attempting to gather things to make them a nice warm home for winter, a horse I saw recently was carrying extra hair, birds are gathering their sticks and twigs. The deer are roaming more than normal looking for feed. The geese are heading south; the butterflies and hummingbirds migrated a few weeks ago.

My grandfather used to say that you could tell how cold a winter we were going to have by watching the animals. “The thicker the fur, the colder the winter.”

For years I thought that to be an old wives tale. Then I ran into an old timer saying the same thing.

Animals also teach us to prey – to watch our surroundings, to be patient. A dog will love his master no matter what the master does. A cat always yearns to be cuddled or petted. They know when they are going to be fed. Most of our pets will follow us to the bin where their food is. Animals have keen sixth senses – they know who is a friend and who is a foe – who is good and who is evil. I made it a saying a long time ago, “if my dog don’t like you, then something is wrong.”

Animals are a comfort in times of disparity or when we are alone.

Animals are like children and need to be cared for as well.

I think we can all learn something from our pets. The most important thing to learn, I think, is to love and trust unconditionally.

God loves us all unconditionally. He loves us so much that he gave his only begotten son to die on the cross to save us from our sins. Perhaps there’s room in all of our lives to love a little more unconditionally people who are different from us, our children, friends, and even our pets.