The object before you now is a living, breathing answer to prayer, and you have rightly named it so. Yet see how frequently the answers to our supplications come wrapped in the swaddling bands of new trials. The Lord sends the blessing, but with the blessing He sends also the school wherein we learn to prize it and to depend more wholly upon Him. Your dog, bounding through the house and over the sofas, breaking the pots and snapping at the lead, is not a contradiction to the answered prayer; he is the answer, and the training of him is the next chapter in your pleading. The very stress you feel, that clamor in the mind that whispers of failure, you did well to call it part of the journey, but call it also a summons to the closet. The danger lies not in the fleeting thought, but in the dark suggestion of the Evil One that whispers, “Forsake the closet! Give up private devotion.” Crush that serpent’s egg before it hatches.
Your prayer in the midst of the confusion, that silent cry shot up from the heart while the dog pulled and jumped, remember, that sincere prayer may often be very feeble to us, but it is always acceptable to God. He does not despise the groan that has no time to form itself into elegant phrases. The first prayer was for yourselves, and He heard it in bringing you this creature; now you have double cause for prayer, for his sake and your own. That instinct to pray when the stress rose is the index of life within, proof that the quickening Spirit has already taken up His abode in you. Hold fast to that.
Do not wonder that the mercy, once arrived, tests your patience. Delays and difficulties in prayer’s outworking may turn out to be a sort of training school for us. The dog fears the lead because he associates it with the kennel, with abandonment. So the soul often shrinks from the very hand that would unshackle it, snapping at love because it has known only confinement. Here is work for intercessory prayer of the highest order. You are not merely training a dog; you are called to be God’s instrument in quieting a frightened spirit. Intercessory prayer will fit you for becoming God’s instrument. Before you touch the lead, touch the throne. Spread your case before the Most High with all the arguments you can muster: His tender mercy toward all He has made, His care for the helpless creature, His promise to make all things work together for good to those who love Him. Get the promise and then offer the prayer, and the prayer will be answered as sure as God is God.
This work requires more than a day’s patience. Prayer, mighty prayer, will yet prevail if it has but time. A year and a half in a rescue kennel cannot be undone in a single afternoon. The terrors ingrained in him will yield, but perhaps not immediately. Jacob’s prayer was answered, but it was not answered in the way he expected it would be. He limped away from Peniel, yet he had prevailed. You may carry the marks of this struggle for a while, the exhaustion, the broken pottery, yet you shall prevail if you faint not. Let your prayer grow fervent and grow united. When by twos and threes in the family, the prayer becomes fervent and grows into a passionate cry, “Oh, God, give wisdom and peace to this house,” then shall abounding blessing follow. Discord always spoils prayer; let this new charge draw your hearts together in love, and you shall see the cloud break.
That frailty you feel in yourself, the quickness to be overwhelmed, utter it as Peter did. But do not turn the Lord away with a “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” Rather cry, “Come nearer still, for I am a sinful man and I need Thy grace to be patient, Thy wisdom to be calm, Thy quickening Spirit to be strong for this task.” The prayer before us is, “Quicken me in Your way.” It deals with your frequent need. A deadened, weary thing cannot train a frightened dog, but a quickened soul, alight with the Spirit, becomes a channel of peace that even a beast can sense.
Take up the work again, but take it up prayerfully. Follow up your prayer by the effort, but let the effort be steeped in the peace of God. Do not be anxious, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. The mercy has come punctually at the very tick of the clock of wisdom, not before nor after. It is precisely the right time for you to learn what God would teach, and for that poor creature to learn the meaning of steadfast love. The Lord turn the heart of this dog toward you even as He turns your hearts in patience and in faith. May the peace of Christ rule in your home, may the calmness of the Spirit settle upon that agitated animal, and may you yet look back on these first trying days as the rough soil out of which He grew a sweet and lasting trust.
Prayer Focus: God, Thank You for loving me. Thank You for loving me, Jesus. God, I ask You in Jesus’ name please bless me with everything that I stand in need of and everything You want me to have. 
