The Grass is Always Greener...

It was a quiet morning in the culdesac. I had made myself a nice latte and was sitting down to work on the sermon that I was writing for church that week.

It was a peaceful morning.

The birds were doing their morning chirping, letting the world, and myself, know that the sun was up, the sky was blue and the day was full of hope and promise. My family was still sleeping and sounds of deep breathing could be heard in the office where I was contemplating my life and God's interaction in it.

I was deep in ecclesiastical thought as the smell of fresh pulled espresso penetrated my nostrils and the sounds of birds, deep breathing, distant cars on the highway and the gentle mooing of cows... ...

Wait a minute... ..

MOOING OF COWS????

We DON'T have any cows... .

As I pushed back the curtains and looked out the window I witnessed an unusual scene for a laid back, culdesac...

Cows... Not just one but a whole herd of them!

All of them were going about their morning, quietly munching on the well manicured lawns of my neighbors.

They were imprinting hoof prints in the soft soil and leaving patches of dirt where once had been lush green Kentucky Bluegrass. They were nuzzling against the cool metal of the neighbors SUV's and lazily meandering out of our little circle of homes in order to find greener pastures and leaving little smelly organic frisbees behind.

I watched in amazement as these bovines of destruction made a smorgasbord out of the neighborhood. It was all you could graze on, and nothing was spared. Grass, flowers and bushes all felt the pull of the cattle's teeth and were soon whisked away to one of the stomachs for processing.

Noticeably missing though from this feast was one yard... MINE !

As these animals made their way from one neighbor to another they passed right by mine. And I started to wonder why?

Was MY grass not good enough for the cows? Was it the fact that my lawn consisted more of dandelions and weeds than actual grass? Or was it more that my lawn is on a steep hill and it was more work to climb it than it was to traipse through the gentle rolling yards of deep green summer fescue.

Soon all of our neighborhood was chasing them, trying to divert these animals OUT of our area. Angry homeowners watched with dismay as their prized lawns became nothing more than fuel for these milk making machines.

As I watched people shooing them, yelling at them and trying to push them one direction or another I started to giggle.

Eventually the shooing and yelling gave way to mooing... .not by the cows... but by US!!

We slowly became a combination of Rich Little and Dr. Doolittle. Doing our best to try to impersonate their sound... it was mooing interspersed with full out belly jiggling laughter!!

Mooing took on different accents; Asian, Southern Drawl, British and Pacific Northwest accents could be heard...it was like a United Nations of cattle and we were the translators.

We all had the same goal. We were all trying in desperation to communicate with them... To get them to move...To keep them from being hit by a car or truck... .We were trying to show them the way home.

And that was the moment when my adventure that day became my sermon.

What a wonderful example God provided that day of how to be a shepherd.

All of our higher education was for naught. All of our studying, learning and BIG words were useless.

What it took that day to return the cattle home to the master was gentleness. It was becoming one with them, interacting with them, guiding them and showing them the way home.

It was NOT telling them, or yelling at them or even our poor attempt at mooing at them.

It was simply to show them the way.

God used and uses people all the time to show us the way. He even sent his only Son to become one of us. So that he could better communicate with us.

I would love to say that I am NOT like the cow, but sometimes I am.

Sometimes I am wandering around enjoying the smorgasbord of life never realizing that I have wandered too far from where God wants or needs me to be.

There have been many times that I have been pushed HARD in one direction or another by someone trying to get me to go where they think I should go. Only to find myself on my back somewhere, wondering what the heck happened.

There is a saying here in Missouri that 'Nothing Tips Like a Cow' but I am not so sure. I think that as humans we tip too easy one direction and then another. Knocked off our feet in a vain attempt to follow man and not God.

I love it when God uses unique ways to teach me something that I need to know. It shows me that I must always be aware of God's presence and of his love for me.

Hmmmmm will you look at that...

I wonder what God is trying to show me now... ..

I think I'll go find out... .JOIN ME?