I’m in Nashville for a minute, working with Steve and Ben. We’re writing voiceover and some additional dialogue for the movie. The whole thing should be locked in a couple weeks, and we are hoping to release it into theaters in the spring. God willing.
I stayed with Ben last year when we shot the film here in town and fell in love with his dog, Molly. Molly is a sheep dog, about sixteen years old now. I got in well after midnight so I didn’t see her but this morning I heard her sniffing around outside my door, and her claws shuffling gingerly against the hardwoods. When I went outside, she was laying across the hallway on the cold kitchen floor, her eyes pointed at me and her tail wagging, but her head against the floor for all it’s weight and how much energy it would take to lift it.
I got down with her and said good morning, and scratched her belly. Her tail flopped against the floor and I believe she smiled. Ben thinks she’s only got a few months left. I told her what a great dog she was and I told her she was still a very good looking dog. I swear she has no idea she’s about to go, she’s about to be swallowed back up into God’s imagination.
There is a puppy heaven
http://www.smbc-comics.com/index.php?db=comics&id=2348
I spent last night mostly in tears because my childhood dog only has a little bit of time left – days, maybe.
So, thanks for making me cry again Don! My eyes were already swollen!!
But this time the tears were happier. I like the idea of her being swallowed back up into God’s imagination.
Why do we have to love animals so deeply???????
Come to Belmont University!!!
I love when time slows down a bit, making something as normal as petting a dog special enough to write about.
love that.
My 12-year-old Great Pyrenese named Molly was swallowed up by God yesterday. Imagine my surprise when I clicked over from twitter to read this blog entry. I feel like God had you write it for me. He’s like that. So sweet and personal and amazing. And yes I cried. Again. Feeling loved.
I know there are arguments about whether there is such a thing as ‘heaven’ for animals – but I don’t believe Father God would lavish such attention to detail in even the least of His creatures to not provide for them when their earthly life is done. I love that last sentiment of being ‘swallowed back up into God’s imagination’! And I hope my faithful hound, Brucie, is running wild and free in heaven’s meadows as we speak!
God swallows them up — that’s beautiful! — and then they are in heaven waiting for us. The Bible doesn’t contradict that view, right? Sam, Willie, and my other furry friends are there. I’m happier believing that so until I find out for sure otherwise, I’m going with that!
My sister had to put her pomeranian down this morning of 8 years., She is so sad. I will let her know that Sophie has been swallowed back up into God’s imagination.
God always seems to show up for us in unexpected ways!
Thinking of Molly!
A beautiful tribute, Don. Thank you for sharing an important but often overlooked slice of life. “I love this moment, and it’s a child of time.” ~ Ahab’s Wife by Sena Jeter Naslund
xoxo michele
Ever hear of Eliot Rausch? This is a beautiful story about a dog’s last days. If you’re a dog lover, make sure to get some tissues before watching. http://bit.ly/jS1mrZ
Can I go with ole yeller insread?
That’s beautiful Don. A visual prose.
I like this story very much. This is what you are gifted in. Please, for the love of God and for the love of the rest of us, be careful what message you send out about others gifts.
It really is really nice.
Dogs are so important to people… I think they just HAVE to go to Heaven.
I love the last ten words.
Good piece, Don.
Hey Don, I’m a youth minister and just did a lesson of MarkO’s about how God is like a dreamer. It was pretty amazing to understand this part of God how he uses his imagination, sense of wonder, and dreaming ability to create us and our world. I loved getting to walk through this process with our Junior High kids because even though they’re young enough to grasp it better than some of the older folks (of which I am now one) they are old enough to be in the process of aging that they had to think back to younger, fresher, more innocent ways of thinking.
As almost always, thanks again for your words that I believe are Spirit breathed.
Such a sweet reflection.
My husband and I ‘differ’ on the fate of dogs/cats/hamsters/etc. Etc.
But I know it gives my heart comfort and joy to believe that the new heaven/new earth paradigm contains ALL of Gods created creatures.
(yes, even spiders and snakes…but never Mosquitos or fruit flies or cockroaches or any of the other plague-types…I’m sure they have committed the equivalent of the unforgivable sin in the insect world…at least that is my hope ;} )
(but it must have dinosaurs…I can’t wait to ride a T-Rex, or a Brantasauras. It will be the ultimate Adventure Park!)
Welcome to Nashville! The last line is priceless. I will use that from now on out. Thank you.
Such a great phrase–she’s about to be swallowed back up into God’s imagination. I always enjoy your posts that are more “instructional” or pointed, but your storytelling ability in posts like this are just as wonderful and thought-provoking. I know I probably won’t see my childhood pets in heaven, but it’s nice to think I will.
God bless man’s best friend. Some of the happiest times of my life were with my old pal.
I hesitated to read this because I just had to put my 17 year old cat down yesterday. I like your description. And I have comfort in the knowledge that she lived a good full life…and had lots of love and quality up until the very end. I always say pets are a little furry vessels of God’s Love. And even in her death, I’m reminded of God’s Love through my friends words and actions proving their compassion for my loss.
Yes. Bittersweet. Love the last line.
Beautiful don. Glad your movie is still going on! I truly believe it will be glorious and moving, just like the book was.
I always like your writings. That said…. your last line in pretty over poetic and utterly vague. Im not used to hearing you speak *God talk* very often. (God Talk as defined by Eugene Peterson)
Overly poetic-utterly vague? Is that what we’ve reduced the ineffable to? Re-write this piece without poetry and mystery and you’ll have the absolute clarity of the void-replete with proper usage.
It’s a sweet last line. I’m sick of prosaic exactitude.
I totally get what you are saying. Glad that works for you and others. Miller can write with poetry and mystery when he chooses, I thought he was running out of bounds to stop the clock…..that’s all! He is unfinished here with time left on the clock. I am unmoved by his ending. He had the play, and threw a cheap trick in to win a game.
OOPS — To TRY and win the game.
Great post! Hooray for Molly and for God who is in all and cares for all creation.
Greetings from Greenbelt festival in the UK. Fantastic to hear about progress with the movie – really looking forward to seeing it here at Greenbelt festival next year if not before. Hope you can make it across too, Mr Miller, sir. =]
Blessings
Most days I don’t believe in heaven. But if any creatures actually get to commune with God after death, it will be dogs.
I too love dogs, not cats so much. Dogs, I think, are love on legs. Love the post. If you have not heard the song God and Dog by Wendy Francisco, I urge you to google it. One of the lines says… God thought up and made the dog, dog reflects a part of God. Isn’t that sweet? So is the song, sweet.
Don – what a heartfelt and tender ode to Ben’s dog. Glad I read your blog today.
…and all of creation is groaning like a woman in labor for the time when it will ALL be made new!
She sounds so sweet!
So beautiful, Don. I absolutely love the idea that my dog was swallowed up by God’s imagination. I will keep this with me always.
–JM
http://femmefuel.com/
Beautiful writing, Don. This is why you’re one of my favorite authors.
[...] did think long and hard about her this morning, though. Donald Miller wrote a post this week that had the most heartwarming sentiment for dog owners: that when your dog passes on, she gets swallowed back up into God’s [...]
Dog’s are very friendly as a human, that’s why when there gone you really miss them.
I love how you love animals.
I adopted a puppy from the pound and found out a few days later that she had parvo and would need to be put down. I sobbed in my car like a hysterical child after I dropped her off. Pets just have a way, man, especially dogs. I’m glad you and Molly were able to connect.
It’s called “The Silmarillion” …. just wanted to clear that up. Mahalo.
Of course I understand that you were being poetic and all of that, and it is a nice sentiment, but I don’t think it’s possible to be swallowed up into God’s imagination. Once he creates you, there you are!
I believe the entirety of God’s creation will be reanimated better than ever, without the shackles of this physical earth at some point in time. (Except possibly for those who reject him.)
I’m looking forward to fulfilling the promise I made to my dear old dog Millie just before she left this world, that someday we would chase rabbits and squirrels and cats together once more. I have no scriptural basis for this belief except for a deep yearning in my soul and for me that’s good enough.
There’s loads of scriptural basis for it, Colossians to start, and your comment is spot-on. My Zoe and I have our own promises to keep, and she’d love to chase some rabbits with Millie.
It’s a deal! Also, I’m going to go read Colossians right now. Thanks.
[...] WOW what an old blog post: Donald Miller’s, “When God Swallows Up Molly,” a short post about a beloved 16-year-old sheep dog. I fell in love with this post for the very last [...]