An Unyielding Pursuit

A Prime Example

I love to bird hunt.  More specifically, I love chasing upland birds like pheasant and quail.  I’ve even tried my hand at trying to flush up a prairie chicken, sadly, with no success.  There is something special about it to me and as long as I live, I think I will always daydream of a big covey of quail flushing at my feet.

As much as I love it though, I must admit, it’s never as sweet as when it’s done behind a quality pointing dog.  My passion for pointing dogs started with my brother’s dog.  She was a German Shorthaired Pointer (GSP) named Dolly.  A tiny specimen for a GSP, but she was a terror both in a bad way and in a good way.  We used to get her out to run and she would get in the pond and chase mud daubers and dragonflies around for hours as she swam.  I used to have to jump in to physically drag her out of the pond.  I’m convinced she would have swum until she drowned if we let her.  Never had I seen such energy in any living thing, that is, until I got my dog about a year later.  She was an American Brittany named Daisy.  Talk about psycho!!!  She was an absolute terror!  She was a good dog, but she was bred to run, and it showed.  She had such a drive for birds that one day when she got out of her pen she went and killed 46 of the neighbor’s chickens…  Sadly, that was the end of me owning her as I had to sell her to pay for the chickens.  Regardless, the two were trouble together!  My brother and I got to know the countryside well as we chased those two all over creation!  I know what you’re thinking, you could have just trained them!  I ask you, would you have done a good job training a bird dog as a middle schooler?  Well, we didn’t. 

There is something special about watching a good pointing dog work a scent in a sea of prairie and nail down a covey of birds in a dense patch of grass. That’s when my favorite part occurs if the dog is good that is.  All the walking and stomping around through the brambles and briars culminates in the point!  For as much trouble as Dolly and Daisy were, they more than made up for it when we went hunting.  They had good noses and bird drives that I would argue were unmatched.  They shined when they hunted.  After all, that’s what they were bred to do.  Those two dogs NEVER sat still! Unless they were on point.  When they pointed at a bird, they were statues, their gaze never breaking away from that spot.  Their entire existence revolved around that moment.  All their work, a relentless pursuit of that moment.  It all culminated in that point, locked in place, such intensity is unrivaled.  There were times when we couldn’t even pull Dolly from a point.  She was staunch in her purpose.

I have so many fond memories of those two dogs and all the times we hunted behind them.

Seek the Kingdom

I think of those dogs, and I wonder if I could ever be so staunch in purpose and intense in pursuit of anything in my life.  It seems a tall task.  Then I read Jesus’ words in Matthew 6:33,

33 But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

The word “seek” here in the Greek has several interpretations but one of its primary ones is as hunting word.  It carries with it that same intensity, passion, and idea of an unyielding pursuit that I associate with Dolly and Daisy.  If I am honest with myself, my “seeking” of the kingdom of God is lackadaisical most days.  Some may ask, “What is the Kingdom of God?” and that is a fair question.  This can be understood in reference to the sphere of salvation.  Jesus is urging us to seek salvation.  Now this pursuit doesn’t end when we become saved but instead it grows.  This pursuit of the Kingdom of God for ourselves is supposed to turn into a pursuit to bring others to that same Kingdom!  Jesus gives us this commission at the end of the book of Matthew in chapter 28.

“Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

I pray that this becomes our unyielding pursuit in life.  If so, we can be guaranteed that we will receive the full care and provision of God.

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