UNEARTHLY THING◽ ENCOURAGEMENT
Cat Call to Prayer
by Angela Dolbear
From the hallway outside my bedroom, a sound like a hoarse, metallic screeching persists, as if a tiny Pterodactyl were summoning me. Then a medium-sized short-haired cat appears in the doorway, calling to me.
Maddy, my formerly stray black cat who adopted me fifteen years ago, calls me to join her in another room to sit and pray.
It’s mystifying to me. Maddy will persist with her unusual meows, which get progressively louder until I follow her into the living room and join her on the floor.
At first, I thought she just wanted me to rub her belly, but then I started to notice my state of mind on the nights she would call me coincided with times when my heart was heavy for me or someone else. That’s when I get a cat call to prayer. I don’t know how she knows.
I do know God uses my usually quiet and sweet black cat to call me to lie on my stomach on the floor of my living room and pour out my heart to God. I thank God for her. When I am going about my normal routine to get ready for bed, she stubbornly calls me until I stop and take time to pray.
He has utilized Maddy several times in an unexplainable way. I was in so much pain the night before I went to the hospital for seven days to eventually get a total hysterectomy due to a large tumor in my uterus. My lower left abdomen was aching terribly. I remember praying—no, pleading— with God to take the pain away.
Then, Maddy softly padded into my bedroom, jumping up on the bed. She climbed up my legs and lay down on top of my stomach, exactly where it hurt. The pain went away almost immediately.
How did she know where I was hurting, except that God told her? I praised Him and thanked him. And fell asleep. I always try to remember this incident, not because I think my cat is exceptional (well, she is), but because God hears me and helps me, even through my animals. He is good like that.
These kinds of “woo-woo” (as the kids currently say) events happen often. I try to notice when they do. And I don’t think they are unbelievable or strange. If I believe Jesus died and rose from death to be my eternal Savior, which I do with my whole heart, then why wouldn’t I believe in events such as these? Or a lovely black cat with the most unappealing meow call me to stop and come away to pray?
This sparked my interest in investigating when God worked through animals in the Bible. He used ravens to feed and care for the prophet Elijah. God made a donkey talk to reprove the wayward prophet Balaam. And a colt transported Jesus into Jerusalem, which fulfilled prophecy.
God used other creatures of the feline species, lions, to intervene in Daniel’s unjust death sentence. He showed His divine protection for Daniel by defending him against the lions in the den. How awesome is that?
But my favorite animal reference in the Bible is when Jesus calls Himself the Lion of the Tribe of Judah. (More cats, big cats. Is God a cat Person? Just kidding, Lord!)
But I do know God surely works through His creatures; that’s for sure. I’m a big animal lover, so I appreciate God’s use of His creatures to accomplish His particular tasks.
I’m so grateful He brought Maddy to me. She was a kitten when she started appearing in my backyard when I lived in Austin, TX. I suspect that my older male cat, who was a kind cat soul, showed her how to come in through the dog door and into the laundry room to eat some of his food I had laid out for him.
I saw her in there; she seemed very skittish. So I took a ribbon and waved it just outside the doorway, hoping to entice her to play. She pounced on the ribbon! We’ve been steadfast friends ever since.
After we bonded over the ribbon play, Maddy waltzed into my office. She made herself comfortable on my desk, curling herself around my keyboard while I wrote. I named her “Maddy” after the main character in my Christian rom-com series of novels called The Garden Key Tales, because the main character was petite with black hair.
She is always near me. She is slowing down now and doesn’t jump up on my desk anymore. It’s hard to watch her age. We both take glucosamine and chondroitin supplements to ease our aging joints.
But she still makes her catcalls outside my bedroom. When God calls upon her to call upon me, she is faithful to persevere with her peculiar meowing until I relent and go to the living room floor with her.
I’m so grateful to God for her and for His unique method of summoning me to pray with Him. He’s so good.