TGIF
I was pulling all manner of noxious weeds out of Liam’s fur this morning and was reminded of what I wrote back in 2015…I miss my friend, but her lessons taught live on…
The official plant of hell is the foxtail.
In case you don’t have it where you live, it’s a grass that produces sharp barbs which burrow into the flesh of animals as they walk through it.
Animals like my cat, Miss Kitty.
With each movement she makes the barbs travel farther and dig deeper.
Twice a day (at least) she comes walking in the house looking like a porcupine and I spend the next hour carefully trying to remove them from her long fur.
In a way it’s become a bonding process for us as it hurts when I remove them…fur is often ripped out with Satan’s flowers.
She has to trust that I’m doing something to help her, not to cause her more pain, though that is often the temporary result.
Our bond was put to the test this morning…I awoke to her sitting in my chair waiting for me to rise.
A foxtail seed had lodged in her eye and the eye had swollen shut around it.
It looked excruciatingly painful and it was.
The smallest of wings was still attached to the seed…if she would let me I’d have one shot to pull the thing out.
She would either trust me and let me try to remove it…or claw me to shreds for trying.
To my amazement, she stoically stood up and looked straight at me…and I plucked the seed from her eye.
She purred some thanks while cleaning the gunk from her eye with her paw.
Two things I learned this morning…
The world is like a field full of foxtails and as we go through it many barbs afflict us…some fall off, some burrow down and cause constant pain.
Sometimes we need someone else to remove them for us…we can neither see them, nor reach them, but we can surely feel them.
Thank God for those who you can trust and who love you enough to try to remove them.
The second thing is sometimes those barbs stick in a place so sensitive that only the Master can remove them.
Everyone can see the barb and the wound, but the risk is too great to remove it.
It has to come out.
The wound has to heal lest you lose vision and perhaps even life.
It takes great trust to allow Him to work.
Do it anyway, even if it causes temporary pain.
He loves you even more than I love my cat…consider it a bonding process.
You can be healed…
Make your own application…
We once had a $1500 surgery bill for a cat with a foxtail that had penetrated all the way through the muscle layers of it’s belly. The tiny reverse barbs act like a rachet that only goes deeper. When checking your cat over, all it takes is missing one.
Terry,
True…I brush Liam multiple times a day…missed on on his paw…got it now, but it hurt.
Very good parable…thanks for sharing. Grace and peace to you!
Another: Great lesson Michael!
Trusting is the key. And, I’m thinking, if I would know where the Trusted one lives, and then stand patiently for the thorns to be pulled out…
Yes? He just whispered to me:
how often you come running in tears and broken hearted, and jump into my lap, ABBA, Father, help me!
And, oh, how much tender love and grace in those moments pour over me… from The awesome One! The One True God!
Growing up we had a pair of springer spaniels who seemed to constantly get foxtails stuck in their ears or between their toes, which often led to a procedure at the vet. Demon weed, indeed!
Uncle Buck,
Thank you!
Elena…well said, my friend…
PH,
They seem to end up in my socks as well…
We are pretty sure our Brittany Spaniel died from complications of a foxtail up her nose.
I remember the first posting of this article. I’m still trying to learn the lesson.