On bathing with your dog

The old joke is "Did you hear about the dyslexic atheist who didn't believe in DOG? OK, bad joke. I just spent a weekend with a bunch of Christians...but it was a lot of fun! Most of them were Catholic...a few came from the Evangelical Christian side. Here we were, a bunch of Catholic Christians and Protestant Evangelicals, with a Catholic priest also. We were all at a Retrouvaille Formation weekend...a writing weekend for people who will "present"- i.e., they will give talks at the Retrouvaille marriage weekends to couples who come because their marriages are in trouble...often serious trouble. The success rate for Retrouvaille weekends is high...much higher than any other kind of intervention. The reason why -- in my humble estimation -- is that people who "present" are people whose marriages also were in crisis mode at one time.
OK...the weekend...it was great, and other things. If I were going to describe the weekend, I would use words like Wonderful, Hard, as well as Frustrating -- because we had to leave early -- and Painful, because we worked on the misery some more. Linda and I have come along way in our marriage, but it has been work, hard work, of which I'm grateful we got the opportunity to do, and have felt the guilt of "how did you ever let things get that bad" more than once. It was a hard weekend, that in the end, I feel personally "God met us" on it. Going to the weekend was hard, because I had to teach on Sunday...two services. I still had a wonderful time reconnecting with people, and surprisingly, I felt the joy all over again with listening to Frank and Julie tell their
stories...they are a wonderful gift to our Retrouvaille community!!!

I also felt a lot of joy in seeing Father Walt again. The last time I saw him was at our weekend, almost three years ago. He is a breath of fresh air, and I enjoy the way he models grace to people who are often hurting.

Oh yeah, the dog.
It was hard weekend in that it was tiring. But, "God met me" wonderfully in the end. On Saturday
night after I got home from Saturday's Formation day, I realized that I was "brain fried". When I got home I felt exhausted and yet I knew that I had to prepare to teach the next day. After about a half hour of futile thinking, I decided to take a jog with the dog and clear my head. We ran for about 20 minutes and when I got back it was almost 9. I decided to take a bath and soak in hot water. That's where I was, praying, asking God for insight and help in preparing -- in the bath tub, with
my eyes closed in prayer -- when all of a sudden, "Splash"...my dog jumped in with me! I said, "excuse me!!!" got up and dried off, got him dried off.

It was then that it hit me..."He just wanted to be with me...that's all". It was then I felt God say,
"Elliott you've been with me this weekend, I won't leave you tomorrow, relax."
Even though I was shot, I went to sleep with that assurance, and Sunday I taught...and although I never feel great after teaching, I honestly can say I felt calm inside...relaxed...and refreshed -- bathing with your dog...or is it dyslexic...God?