The Neighbor’s Dog

He who knew no sin became sin for us, that I through Him might become the righteousness of God.  — 2 Corinthians 5:21

The neighbors and I have worked out a deal.  When I am away, they will feed my cats.  When they are away, I will feed their dog and cat.  The day that I am writing this happens to be one of those days that I fed their animals.  I have learned that their dog gets extremely excited when he sees me.  He basically runs circles around me, jumps on me, licks me, play bites me, the whole nine yards.  Sometimes I am about to go somewhere so I know how to maneuver around him so that I don’t get slobber or dirt on me.  However, this morning, I chose to do something different.  I got up, put on some already dirty clothes and headed on over.  I let the dog smear dirt on me, slobber on me, get fur all over me, we just had a great time for about 30 minutes.  As I left him, I could tell that he was just so thankful and content.

Walking back home, the Lord just filled my heart with His Presence.  He didn’t actually say words to me, but He spoke to me.  I realized that for a while, in the Old Testament, God attempted to feed people without getting dirty.  He basically gave His People the essentials only.  But, in the New Testament, God didn’t just feed His people, He put on a his “dirty clothes”, a human body, and came down here to love on me.  Not only that, He lets me jump on Him when I am angry and need to vent, He lets me slobber on Him when I get all crying and snotty because of the thickness of His Presence, He lets me wipe all of my sinful dirt on Him, and here’s the cool part…we both enjoy it like crazy.

There is nothing like having a relationship with God.  I can honestly say, He is the best friend I have.  There is nobody that could possibly love me more extravagantly or give to me more extravagantly.  Sin sought to destroy my life, for that is what sin does.  I forget how awful and vile sin actually is.  Sin makes God so small, and me so big.  It is so vile, that sin has to be punished.  It will not be allowed in God’s Holy presence.  To think that God took my sin, smeared it all over Himself, and allowed that sin to be killed along with His sinless, perfect body makes me want to serve Him and give Him the best that I have for the rest of my days.  There really is no one like Him.  There is no other story that has ever been told with this kind of power.

Have you been made righteous through the Lord Jesus Christ?  If not, confess your sin to Him, receive Him, and place your trust in Him.

Later

Adam