Adapted from Edward Grinnan’s Editor’s Note for the November 2018 issue of Guideposts. If you’d like to subscribe, click here.
I contribute devotions—little spiritual stories with a takeaway lesson and a prayer—to our annual devotional book, Daily Guideposts. This morning when I got to work, I opened up an e-mail from another Daily Guideposts writer, Carol Kuykendall, who had just finished reading my devotion for the day. Carol and I have a few things in common, including dogs, especially golden retrievers.
I write a lot about my dogs and what they teach me. In fact, I wrote a book for Guideposts about my late golden retriever called Always By My Side: Life Lessons From Millie and All the Dogs I’ve Loved. When my wife and I lost Millie to cancer a few years ago, we were devastated. Eventually we overcame our grief and found another golden, a puppy we named Grace.
Carol’s golden, Kemo, saw both Carol and her husband through several years of cancer treatments. Kemo was always by their side. Recently Kemo passed on. Carol was so heartbroken, she wasn’t sure she could ever get another dog. Finally she was ready. Until she read my devotion.
I’d written about what a handful Gracie had been as a puppy, masticating almost everything in her path, including TV remotes, phone chargers, credit cards, a shower curtain—you name it.
“Edward, I’m not sure I could handle another puppy.”
I assured her Gracie had grown into a magnificent, responsible adult dog, one my world practically revolved around. “Didn’t you read my prayer at the end of the devotion? I asked God for the gift of greater patience. That’s exactly what he and Gracie gave me.”
I hope I reassured Carol. What struck me as more interesting, though, was the way a devotion had brought us together. That’s what stories do. They draw us closer. I can’t help but mention that readers love stories about God’s creatures. If you haven’t heard by now, we have a new magazine, All Creatures: The Animals Who Share Our Lives. If you’re still working on your Christmas list, I have three suggestions: Daily Guideposts, All Creatures and Always By My Side.
