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longshot
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Registered: Mar 2006
Location: Southwest Missouri
Posts: 2057

Recent Sermon titled "Lessons Learned from a Coondog

I do a little preaching from time to time and recently I did a Sermon about coon hunting and the life lessons from it. My Church announced on Facebook that I'd be preaching next Sunday on this topic and I was shocked when over 250 people packed the church to hear this message.

I had no idea it would garner such attention, but it certainly did and a 32 year old man was saved that day.

God can use a lot of different things to teach us, so he certainly can use a coondog too. My church Secretary took the time to type up this message , so I'll post it here for anyone who wants to take the time to read it.

The only issue with reading a sermon verses hearing it is, you don't get the facial expressions, voice inflections and other personal experiences like a live sermon, but you can still get the main idea by reading it. The other missing piece is the Power point that goes with the sermon cant be displayed here.

I take absolutely NONE of the credit for it myself. God inspired me to preach it and he gets all the Cred.

I hope someone out there enjoys and gets a blessing from it. Here it is > Lesson's learned from a Coondog.

Sermon Title - Lessons learned from a Coondog.
The story of Balaam’s Donkey surely demonstrates that God can use any means to communicate his message. In this somewhat humorous but somewhat sad passage God uses a donkey to get through to a stubborn and rebellious man.

Numbers 22:22-34 : “Then God’s anger was aroused because he went, and the Angel of the Lord took His stand in the way as an adversary against him. And he was riding on his donkey, and his two servants were with him. 23 Now the donkey saw the Angel of the Lord standing in the way with His drawn sword in His hand, and the donkey turned aside out of the way and went into the field. So Balaam struck the donkey to turn her back onto the road. 24 Then the Angel of the Lord stood in a narrow path between the vineyards, with a wall on this side and a wall on that side. 25 And when the donkey saw the Angel of the Lord, she pushed herself against the wall and crushed Balaam’s foot against the wall; so he struck her again. 26 Then the Angel of the Lord went further, and stood in a narrow place where there was no way to turn either to the right hand or to the left. 27 And when the donkey saw the Angel of the Lord, she lay down under Balaam; so Balaam’s anger was aroused, and he struck the donkey with his staff.
28 Then the Lord opened the mouth of the donkey, and she said to Balaam, “What have I done to you, that you have struck me these three times?”
29 And Balaam said to the donkey, “Because you have abused me. I wish there were a sword in my hand, for now I would kill you!”
30 So the donkey said to Balaam, “Am I not your donkey on which you have ridden, ever since I became yours, to this day? Was I ever disposed to do this to you?”
And he said, “No.”
31 Then the Lord opened Balaam’s eyes, and he saw the Angel of the Lord standing in the way with His drawn sword in His hand; and he bowed his head and fell flat on his face. 32 And the Angel of the Lord said to him, “Why have you struck your donkey these three times? Behold, I have come out to stand against you, because your way is perverse before Me. 33 The donkey saw Me and turned aside from Me these three times. If she had not turned aside from Me, surely I would also have killed you by now, and let her live.”
34 And Balaam said to the Angel of the Lord, “I have sinned, for I did not know You stood in the way against me. Now therefore, if it displeases You, I will turn back.”

Let’s Pray; Lord forgive us for being a stubborn people. Our nature is often to resist and rebel against you and your ways. Sometimes it takes extreme measures to get our attention as we saw in this passage. Just like Balaam, may you open our eyes today to see your truth. In Jesus name Amen.

* intro So God used a donkey to teach a lesson to a stubborn man. I believe God can and does use various means to get his message to us….

We’re gonna have a little fun today, and at the same time reveal some Biblical truth.

Most of you know I’ve coon hunted all of my life. It’s not just been a hobby or fleeting pastime. It’s been a passion for me and it’s taken me all over the country. I’ve hunted coons in 12 different states and owned over 50 adult coondogs.

And I’ve often said that coon hunting is a microcosm of life. Seriously,,,, a lot of stuff you learn there will relate to everyday life. That’s the truth.

Every coondog is different. They have different talent levels and skills sets and they all have different personalities, just like people do. A lot can be learned….

(Powerpoint slide 1; So my sermon title today is “Lessons learned from a Coondog.” I’m gonna offer 5 things I’ve learned from a coondog in my life.

Before we jump into this, I wanna show you a few pictures because I know many people don’t have any experience with the sport... Plus, I’ve even got some pictures of some folks in the congregation today and they dont know it, so this will be fun…
(show slides and pictures and comment)

I wanna have some fun with this today, but just like Balaam’s Donkey, there are real truths here. It’s not all frivolous. These are real lessons… So here we go, Lessons learned from a Coondog..

(slide #1 ) 1. How to handle stress….

Look at that slide. Is that not the perfect example of how to handle stress? There is perhaps no better teacher than a coondog on how to handle stress… I go to these coon hunts where Champions and money are on the line. The pressure to win is enormous. I got butterflys in my stomach..

I pay my entry fee and walk out to the truck only to find my dog like this. (point to sleeping dog on screen)
He’s not fretting about it at all. He’s just chillin out….. Oh, if only more people could be like that Amen?

Our lives are filled with stress. And if we cant find something to stress about, we’ll go hunt something up, won’t we?

(slide ) But our Lord Jesus Christ gave us strong words to lean on in John 14:27 “ Peace I leave with you; not as the world gives peace, but My peace I give you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.”

(slide) And again in Romans 8:31 “What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?”

Life is filled with challenges. But we should always remember, if God is on our side, and he is,then it’s all gonna be fine…

The 1st valuable lesson we can learn from a coondog is to “chill out.” Life is gonna happen with us or without us, so we just as well let God do the driving and come along for the ride. Right?

(slide) The second to learn from a coondog is # 2. Doing what you love…

One of the things about coondogs, is that they love to hunt. I love to hunt too, but I’ll pick and choose my nights to go. But my dogs? They don’t care if it’s 10 below zero and 30 mph winds. If you wanna go, they’ll go too. They do it because they love to do it. It is their calling in life….

I wonder how many of us should seek our life calling with a zeal like that? How many of us have settled for something less than what God intended for us?

I wonder how many people could actually do something for the Lord, but they never try? Good grief, I never thought I’d be a preacher, but here I am.

I think there are truck loads of people that never take the plunge in life and see what God could have done with their lives? Have you ever thought about what you’ve missed out on because you just simply didn’t push for it? Maybe you were afraid or whatever…

(slide) I think of Phillipians 3:14 “I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.”

The lesson from a coondog is he was born to hunt coons,,,,, and he’s willing to go anytime, anyplace, because he loves it. It’s his calling !

I wish more people would seek and pray about God’s plan for their lives and then do it..

(sld) The third lesson from coondog is # 3. Pursue your calling with passion…

One thing about a good coondog is; he may lay around all day long, but when the sun goes down, he’s all business then. They are passionate about what they do.

Jerry Clower tells a story called “coon on the log” where the winner is the first dog that can pull a coon off log in the middle of the river. The coon is placed on a log and the winning dog has to swim out and pull him off and that take a a lot of grit, cause the coon will take a chuck out of them. Clower said a fella brought a great big o’le 100 lbs dog and all he did was buggar bark. He didn’t have the guts to wade in and grab that coon.

But a little o’le skinny, wormy, hookworm female not more than 45lbs soaking wet, just swam out there and yanked that coon down, right now !
She did it because she was gritty and passionate about her purpose……

Seriously now - how many of us, when it comes to witnessing to a neighbor, we just back up and buggar bark instead of diving right in?

We’re like that big o’le muscled up dog – we look good from the outside, but there’s a coward inside of us…..

And that little o’le scrawny female that drug that coon out is like the widow woman that lives on the corner and has lead 7 of her neighborhood kids to Christ but nobody even knows about it. She’s like that little skinny dog – she’s loyal to her cause!!!

I had a dog several years ago before we had GPS tracking and I lost him when a snowstorm come up. I drove around looking for him, but finally went home about 3am without him. The next day I went back looking for him and found him at 10am , still treed under a coon. He had barked his voice out and beat down all the snow around the tree and had ice cycles hanging off him, but he was still treed !

He was gritty and tough and determined ! There’s a lesson there for us all. When we find our calling in life, and our purpose, we should do it with passion for the Lord.

(slide) Colossians 3:23 “And whatever you do, do it with all your might, as to the Lord and not to men.”

God don’t want us to be mediocre. Don’t you just love people that are all in? I love passionate people… and God does too…

(sld) Revelation 3:15-16 “I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were cold or hot! But because you are Luke-warm, I will vomit you out of my mouth.”

I never could stand a half hearted coondog and God don’t appreciate a half hearted followers either.

The 3rd Lesson learned from a coondog - Be passionate!

(Slide) The 4th lesson is Being consistent.

The best coondogs are the consistent ones. When you turn ‘um loose and they’re all business. If you’re gonna win in competition, your dog must be consistent, or you’re gonna get beat…

The same thing applies in our lives. Consistency always wins out. Cardinal Baseball manager Whitey Herzog said this, “ give me a consistent player any day over one who hits 3 home runs in one game,,,, then goes 0 for 20 for the next week.”

He’s right. It’s the steadfast tortoise than wins the race over the rabbit.

(slide) 1 Corinthians 15:58 “Therefore brethren, be steadfast, immovable (meaning consistent) , knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.”

You cant win a coon hunt with a dog that’s inconsistent. Coon hunting is that way --- Baseball is that way---- the Stock Market is that way---- and Life in general is that way too… Learn to be consistent and you’ll find success…

(slide) The 5th Lesson from a coondog is “Thinking you’re getting away with it.”

I said earlier that coondogs have personality just like people. # 5 is where coondogs are just like us. They are extremely smart and if they think they can get away with something, they’ll try you out.

I had a nice female named Grace that was a coon treeing machine, but ever once in a while she’d tree a possum. I whipped her several times for it and she got where she would still tree the possum but would shut up and leave when she saw my light coming. She knew I would be mad and she’d leave the tree and go find a coon.

She just couldn’t give up the Sin of treeing a possum and thought she was hiding it from me. Ain’t we often the same way with God? We talk a good game, but we sin in secret….

What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, right? Problem is, God knows about Vegas too.

Back in the 80’s I had a big Black & Tan dog named Big John. He had super talent and was capable of winning any hunt he was in. But he had one bad fault.

He would run a deer like he was tied to it. I’ve seen him just smoke one for miles. On a few occasions, I’d drive to a crossing in the truck and catch him just as he was crossing a road after that deer and I’d wear out a hickory switch on him.

But Big John got smart about it. He’d make sure he was far away from me, then he’d find him a deer to chase… Nowadays they have shock collars, but I didn’t have one back then.

So Big John would run that deer knowing that if I caught him, he was gonna get a whoopin.
So he’d run it till he got tired, then fall off on a coon and get treed. That way I’d always find him under a coon and I couldn’t whip him.

He was smart enough to know he needed a happy ending under a coon.. He got smart !

Some of you have had kids do that…. They do something bad and try to cover it up and make up for it… Moms , when your son says, “let me do the dishes mom” , you know something is up , right? Big John was like that.

He’d run a deer, then smile at me while under a coon.
That’s a true story. You’d be surprised how many dogs will run junk (trash- coondog talk), then fall off on a coon so they dont get in trouble with their Masters. Ask any coon hunter and they’ll tell you it’s common.

Again, I ask you, aren’t we the same way with our Lord? We love to chase after our favorite sin like we’re tied to it….. We do our best to keep everybody else from knowing about it and we sure dont want God knowing.
We smile at church, but Saturday night, we was at the beer joint.

We really ain’t no different than that deer chasing, possum treeing coondog are we? But God knows about it…..

(slide) Ecclesiastes 12:14 “For God will bring every deed into judgment, including every secret thing.”

(slide) Proverbs 28:13 “He who conceals his sins will not prosper, but the one who confesses and forsakes them finds mercy.

Let me tell ya something important here….. If you’ve got secret sin in your life that you think you’re hiding from God, you’re dreaming. You don’t have to tell me about it, but you sure enough better be confessing it to God and asking forgiveness.

This is extremely important.. You cannot hide from God !

(slide) The 6th lesson from a coondog is “Pleasing your Master”

The best coondogs in the world all have one thing in common. They have a strong desire to please their Masters. The dog I have right now (Sambo) is happiest when he makes me happy. I can give him a pat on the head and it makes his day. He literally loves to please me…

The Bible says we should have that same attitude toward our Master,,,, God.

(slide) Colossians 1:10 “Walk in a manner worthy to please the Lord in all respects.”

(slide) Hebrews 13:16 “Do not forget to do good and to share with others, for of such sacrifice God is well pleased.”

That’s a lesson you can learn from a coondog. And you might ask, “well why do I need to work so hard to please God? What’s in it for me?”
To answer that, let me again go back to the coondog… When my dog pleases me, what do I do for him???

The answer is,,,, I make sure he’s well fed for one thing… I make sure he’s got a nice bed a hay to sleep on and good medical care. I take real good care of him….

God does the same thing for those that that are well pleasing to him…There is great value in pleasing your Master. Another lesson learned from a coondog, Amen?

(sld) #7 and the final lesson is “Growing old gracefully”

I hate getting old. I hate seeing people around me get old and I hate seeing my good dogs get old. Dogs age a lot faster than people and I’ve lost many of them in my lifetime.

Typically, a coondog will live about 12 years…
The dog I have right now is 11 and he’s been a great one to me. But he’s starting to have trouble jumping up in the truck bed- the same truck that he’s jump in 10 thousand times before, is now a struggle. He’s got some arthritis and doesn’t run as fast as he used too, and often has a limp…

But here’s the lesson… he doesn’t let it keep him from enjoying what he can do. He still has that same great attitude. He wants to go hunting and he’s always delighted to see me… None of that has changed at all. In his heart, he’s still a puppy…

There’s a lesson for us all in that… Aging and dying is a part if living. Life under the sun has an expiration date, and we’re all headed for that appointment with death.

But we should make the most of our days and rejoice that God has given us a great life here, and the promise of eternal life in the future,where we won’t age and death will be No more.

A good friend of mine had a real nice female back in the 80’s and he won hunts all over the country with her. They were a were a force to be reckoned with in competition. She was his favorite dog of all time.

When she died I remember my friend took it real hard and that’s the only dog I ever seen him make a grave maker for. I walked out to read it and it simply said, “She treed a bunch of ‘um.”

I thought , “what a fitting tribute to a great hound that lived an outstanding life.” - and I thought to myself ,”what would I like to see on my tombstone when I die?”

How great would it be to have written on your tombstone, the words of Matthew 25, “well done good and faithful servant. Enter into the Joy of your Lord.”

(slide) and that my friends is a great “lesson learned from a coondog…”

Let’s pray; Lord, I’ve said many times before that life is a journey with many lessons along the way. I believe you do use many different ways to communicate and grow us as we go through life. God help us all to have our eyes open to your lessons and make us into the people you want us to be. And Lord, if anyone here needs to make a decision or have a closer walk with you, let them step out today. I thank you for all your many blessings on us all. In Jesus name, Amen.

__________________
Mark Reavis
Southwest Missouri
Dual Grand Champion Super Sambo

Last edited by longshot on 09-22-2017 at 12:32 AM

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Bill(Chew)
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Thank you.

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swamp1
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Thumbs up Praise God

What a inspirational powerfull wonderful message to live by. Lesson 5 stands out for us humans,glaringly. " You may juggle human laws,you may fool with human courts,but there is a judgment to come,and from it there is no appeal. Thank you, sir.

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joutdoorsman
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I like that, it put some though, in how we think and should look a little deeper in to our own lives and heart.
Good job well said Mr. Mark

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Rex Ridge
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Bet no one fell asleep during your sermon....enjoyed it very much. Thanks for sharing.

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longshot
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Thanks guys for the nice words.

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Old Post 08-16-2017 01:57 AM
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steve bankston
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GOD BLESS YOU

Awesome Sermon, Thanks for Sharing.

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Redneck Mafia
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Btw.
In reading the daily devotional tonight that so many of us follow I thought I'd bring this one back to the top for those that may have missed it the first time around and worth the re-read for the rest of us.

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Hey Preacher!!!
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I love it!!!

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