Encouragement

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I wrote this story for the challenge word, "Lock"
I will tell you that there is very little fiction here. In the challenge, the story has been cut down to match the word limit. There is so much lost in the short version. Thanks for reading it and May God Bless You Greatly!

Ageless Master Lock
By Mary Alice Bowles
3/10/06


I had a birthday back in January and I feel really sad about it, like a weight has been hung around my neck, a weight called old age. Every week I would read the obituaries and there would be at least one or two people in there that I knew. I thought, “sooner or later there isn’t going to be anyone left in this world beside me that I know”. My friends were passing one by one.

I would wake up every day of my life thinking, “Well this is probably my day to leave the world”. After that special birthday, I just could not make my life the same. I turned from being a happy-go-lucky person into a stress filled rack of nerves. My life just drudged on and on! Every day, I would think, “woe is me, I am so worried about growing old, I cannot enjoy living but things changed for me drastically on February 16, 2006

I so often take a back country road to work where bumps and chug holes make me drive at a low rate of speed. That way I can enjoy the morning and watch the birds as they spread their wings and fly from one side of the road to the other.

I was driving extra slow that morning thinking about getting old, my mind was lost in walking canes and nursing homes. I had no music on because I was drowning in self pity. Suddenly I was brought back from my old age pity party by a dog. This dog was the oldest dog I have ever seen in my life. How in the world did this dog who is about as old as Methuselah get out here on this deserted road? A look in my rear-view mirror told me that this dog was making every stride that I did. I almost fainted, because not only was he making every step that I did, but he was riding on my left rear bumper. He was taking slow easy steps, even though my car was going at about 45 miles per hour.

That dog was so beautiful, words cannot capture his beauty. I could tell that he was 100 percent Red Lab. His long grey whiskers hung to his feet and the wind was blowing them back and forth. His eyes were as clear as crystal. I could tell that he was on a secret mission because I could almost see to his soul. As he walked, his head never turned to the left or the right, he just kept his head down and his eyes on the path. I have never seen such peace on anything or any one in all the days of my many years.

I thought “Oh God help me”. I was so scared I went in the ditch but I pulled my old Thunderbird back out of the ditch like an Indy driver. I thought, “Surely I lost the dog because he could not hold on with me going in the ditch”. To my dismay there he was! I turned the rear view mirror around, so I couldn’t watch any more and proceeded on down the road shaking in my shoes. I was totally convinced that this was my D-day. I was going to get killed before I got to work.

On up the road about another 200 yards, I saw a Mourning Dove just sitting in the middle of the road preening and looking beautiful. I thought, “She is so gorgeous, but I know she will fly before I get there so I don’t have to worry about putting my foot on the brakes”. To my disbelief, that dove did not fly, my brakes came to a screeching halt, making my tires burn rubber on the road. She sat there watching me out of the corner of her eye and then turning, she looked me in the face and her blue eyes glowed with inner peace. She spread her wings and flew off into the morning sun.

I sat there all alone, stunned and in disbelief at all the things I had seen on my journey. I slowly turned my rear view mirror back in the direction of my left bumper. The dog was gone, but this tiny voice said, “We must go forward on this narrow path, looking neither to the left or the right, for on this straight and narrow path we find eternal life”. Walk slowly and remember to gather flowers along the way!

Then this thought came to me. Our birth and death are locked in time and only God holds the key. He is our Master Lock. We should not worry about our age but go forward and live every day to the fullest, always walking the path for Christ!

It is so wonderful to know that one day when my eyes close in death, I will fly away to be with Jesus for in his Word he said: “Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God and believe also in me. In my Father’s house there are many mansions. If it were not so, I would have told you.
I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you. I will come again, and will receive you to myself so that where I am you will also be.

Then my mind went to this scripture: Psalm 116:15
"Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints"

The Ageless Lock

Our birth and death are locked in time
By the one who holds the key
He is the Master Lock
He takes care of me

He knows the way I am
He still loves me even though
I worry and fret about old age
He is still turning my lifes page

My Master holds the Lock and owns the Master Key
To the age and time of departure
When he will call to me
Then I will hear him say
“Come home my child, and rest a little while”!

©Mary Alice Bowles
3/10/06

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