I’m not really a cat person, but oh boy… today I’ve got a cat story for you.

Once upon a time, when I was in elementary school, we got three cats.

Really, they were barn cats and they weren’t allowed in the house, but they still felt like mine. They were sisters, and their names were Maddie, Sophia, and Krissy. Maddie ran away soon after we got them, leaving us with Sophia and Krissy.

Sophia and Krissy were opposites. Krissy was sweet and affectionate—and even though we weren’t always gentle, she never so much as scratched. And let’s just say Sophia is the reason I’m still not a cat person to this day.

Sophia and Krissy both had two litters of kittens. There was a lot of cat drama in there, including a kitten with an oversized head and a couple of kittens we had to bottle feed, but I’ll skip over those parts. Here’s the most important detail: after a few years, Sophia managed to scare all the other cats away until she was the only cat left on the farm. (At least, that’s our idea of what happened!)

For years and years, Sophia was the only cat around the farm. She lived a long, healthy life. When she died a few months ago, she had to be close to twenty years old. 

And here’s where the story gets exciting: almost right after she died, a gray-and-white cat began hanging around my parents’ house. The neighbor had recently left his house, and our best guess was that this new cat wandered down the road to the farm. When my dad fed her and made her a little bed on the porch, she decided to stick around.

It had been years since any of us had seen Krissy—well over a decade—so we didn’t make the connection right away. But then, just a few weeks ago, my mom found a photo of young Maddie, Krissy, and Sophia, and sure enough… Krissy had returned. She is much older and a little mangy, but she has the same coloring, the same face shape, and the same distinctive dot on her nose.

We couldn’t believe it. Krissy hadn’t just come down from the neighbor’s house… she came back home. I like to joke that she is our quarantine miracle cat.

Okay, so that story may or may not have been interesting to you. I think it’s pretty exciting. But the more I thought about Krissy and her trip back home, the more I wondered if there’s a lesson in there for our own lives.

Maybe it’s a stretch, but here it goes:

God will always welcome us home, even when we run away scared.

Krissy ran away because she was scared of Sophia—that’s the story we created, anyway. And sometimes, we run away from God because we are scared. We run to Netflix because we are scared of the new things He is calling us to. We run to the news because we are afraid of what is going on in the world. We run to people to give us comfort. We run to distractions because we can’t face our fears.

Even though God’s word is filled with reminders that we don’t have to be afraid. He is with us.

Here’s the good news: just like we welcomed Krissy back with joy in our hearts, God will always welcome us back to His open arms. It’s like Jesus’ story of the prodigal son in Luke 15:20: “But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.”

God will always welcome us home because He loves us. He created us. He’s never abandoned us. Even though we are broken and even though we are afraid and even though we run away.

That’s a truth to fill us with hope and joy in the days ahead, no matter what they bring.

Never forget… you are onederfully created.

Love,
Becca