When I was a child, I loved Thursdays because that was the day in school when our class got to go to the library. When I scanned the shelves for a book, my criteria was a bit different from most kids. My book had to center around a dog, or dogs, the more the better. Old Yeller, Clifford The Big Red Dog, The Call Of The Wild were all childhood favorites. It was about the age of 11 when I first discovered The Incredible Journey by Sheila Burnford. I didn’t let the cat on the cover dissuade me, there were also two dogs on the front so the cat to dog ratio met my book selection criteria. I poured over every page, I swam across the muddy river, I winced as porcupine needles were tediously pulled from Luath’s infected jaw, and how can one hold back the tears as the animals lovingly bound into the arm’s of the family for whom they had endured so much to finally return? I thought such journey’s were only found in books until I recently read the story of Mason. This one was true and it really made me think about what it means to return “home”.
Mason is a scruffy, Benji-looking dog from North Smithfield, Alabama who found himself cowering in the corner of his families garage while tornado sirens wailed in the distance. As hail rained down and winds whipped this small southern town, the family frantically called to their dear friend but fear would not allow Mason to budge. Desperate to find cover as the tornado approached, they had to abandon their search and find safety for themselves. In a matter of minutes, nature’s fury subsided and the stunned family slowly emerged from their safe spot to find their home destroyed, their town lying in rubble and the garage that, unbeknownst to them, was the chosen refuge for Mason, totally wiped away. Once more, they called out for their dog hoping for that Incredible Journey ending; the sight of Mason leaping from among the rubble into their arms. But Mason, like the garage he once clung to, was gone.
For weeks, the family returned to their home, picking through remnants of their life, hoping to find a photograph or a treasured family heirloom or perhaps even Mason, miraculously clinging to life under a piece of furniture but the miracle was still too come. Three weeks after the devastation, the family returned to once again salvage what they could from their home when there, on the porch, was a bedraggled, dirty, weary scrap of a dog they called Mason. It was apparent that Mason had indeed returned from an incredible journey but amongst the joy and tears they realized that Mason had made that journey on two horribly mangled front legs. No one knows how long the journey was or what that journey entailed; no one knows the pain that Mason experienced, the hunger and the desperate longing for the people he most loved. What mattered was that Mason made it; he was home and there was incredible joy.
Where is our home? Is it the four walls with the 42” HD TV and leather sectional? The brick colonial with the two-car garage? Or is our home one that we’re still making our way towards? Our home here on earth is, at times, quite comfortable but other times we are faced with devastation and destruction. They whip up at a moments notice; a midnight phone call, an x-ray just back from the lab and suddenly, our home is turned upside down. Just when we think we will never recover, we again find some semblance of normalcy, the joy returns and we hunker down for the next big storm. It’s called life. And while it’s difficult at times, we always seem to pull ourselves up by our two good legs and move ourselves along. But the Bible reminds us that this is not all there is, “...just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.” (Rom. 6:4) Our true home is yet to come and it promises not to have the storms we experience while living in our three bedroom bungalow, “There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” (Rev. 21:4) Sounds like a good place to lay down roots. I’m sure, at times in his journey, Mason felt lost and alone but he knew there was a place waiting for him filled with the people he loved and plenty of comfort and security. That vision of home is what kept him moving forward. The happiness and joy that greeted him when he finally made it through the rubble gave him strength as if all of the pain had never happened. The destination made the journey worth every step. And an incredible one it was.
