My dog, Baxter...

went to be with You yesterday. We're all a little sad. My Mom feels guilty that she didn't do enough for him. He hadn't been feeling well and kept throwing up off and on. After 2 times of getting her up in the wee hours of the morning, she put him outside with a blanket in his dog house. Got up and got ready for church, ran to the store...ran into my brother, Zach and found out that Baxter had passed away. I keep telling her that she had no way of knowing that he was going to die. He had done this before and gotten through it many times. Anyway, Zach is taking it pretty hard. Zach and I used to fight over that dog when I lived at home. Zach buried him on the side of the house under a tree that he constantly used to lay under and Mom asked him later if he had gotten his collar before he buried him. Zach said yes and he had had it tied around his wrist. I was teary eyed until Mom told me that and then I began to cry. He was a good dog...Mom called him "Old Faithful." He was very loyal and loving to Mom after Dad left her...he seemed to sense her pain and he was always by her side, so this is hard on her too. I told her that I didn't know if animals went to Heaven for sure, but I couldn't see You creating all of them and then just letting them disappear after they passed away, so I think he's up in Heaven running the side of the fences teasing the bigger dogs and getting them all riled up like one of his favorite pasttimes. Help us all with our grief, Abba. He was a good little dog. We all loved him.