A week ago today we got a new puppy-- a now eight-week old Golden Retriever who we named Cooper.  Like all puppies, he's cute, playful, and exhausting.  He has so much to learn, and needs to be taught correctly so that he becomes the companion he is meant to be.  It is a big, and very rewarding, undertaking.

Getting and raising a puppy is also a spiritual experience.  It makes you slow down and appreciate the physical world around you. We were at our cabin this weekend, and as I stood outside supervising Cooper's exploration of ferns and moss and long blades of grass, I had a chance to watch dragonflies dart after mosquitoes in and out of the shadows of the woods, and hear the sound of the wind in the pine trees.  Of course those kinds of things are always present, but who takes the time to observe them unless something-- like a puppy-- forces you to stand in one place and watch?

Having a puppy forces you to get past self-absorption and requires interaction.  There is no app on your phone, no text message, no device protocol that will substitute for personal time and focus when it comes to raising a puppy. You can't do it with one eye on the latest Facebook postings.

And that's all good.  Increasingly we live in a world where our interactions are mediated by technology.  In place of meetings we have Web-Ex conferences.  Rather than phone calls we send texts and emails.  We have online personalities that can differ considerably from who we really are.  The list goes on.
Puppies don't care about the latest tweet.  Puppies experience what seems to be pure joy just in  your presence.  They live completely in the moment.  They carry no baggage.  They remind us of the beauty of God's creation and of our role in it-- and of the energy it takes to do what we are called to do correctly.
There are no shortcuts in raising a puppy.  Cooper goes to his first puppy-school class tonight.  He needs to learn to sit, stay, come, heel and all the rest.  That will take consistent time and dedication from his "parents." 

There are no shortcuts in the spiritual life either.  And maybe God thinks of us a bit in the same way that we think of puppies-- we're lovable, time-consuming, sometimes troublesome, always in need of supervision and energy. We too need to be taught to hear and obey commands, and to come when called.

And, like puppies, we can be easily distracted by the bright, shiny things that flash around us.
But if we give God a fraction of the joy that a puppy can give us, we're doing pretty darn well.