Old dogs, new tricks...

They say that you can't teach an old dog new tricks, and I think that's true unless your dog happens to be a border collie. As I discovered with my Kylie, collies are so clever that they thoroughly enjoy learning new things, even when puppyhood is a distant memory. This week, however, I'm trying to find out if you can teach old cats new tricks! Somewhere along the line, although my cats have a round-the-clock supply of dry pet food, I began giving them a sachet of moist cat food at breakfast time. The result of this habit over the years has been that all three cats come into my bedroom very early in the morning and either purr or miaow and march around on the bed to wake me up and make me aware that it's time for me to get out of bed and go downstairs to give them breakfast. As no one has been giving them this customary breakfast over the past ten weeks that I spent in Scotland, I decided that this was the ideal time for them to learn new habits. Despite their indignant miaowing while I'm preparing my morning coffee, I'm not giving them their "meaty chunks in gravy" at breakfast time any more, but am making them wait until some other time later in the day - sometimes at lunchtime or sometimes at bedtime. It seems to be working and I'm slowly seeing them change their habit and their expectation.

It made me think, though, about how we as human beings are also creatures of habit. Sometimes we've had our set ways of doing things for a whole lifetime and it can be really costly for us to embark upon transformation. We've got stuck in our old ways of thinking, speaking and acting, and it can be difficult to change these - especially as we get older in life. But knowing and following God is a continuous learning curve; He is constantly showing us attitudes and habits that need to be adjusted in order for us to become more like Jesus. This morning in my personal time with God, I was reading in Acts chapter 13. Speaking about King David, it says that he was a man who was pleasing to God and who was always willing to do what God wanted. My prayer for 2012 is that I would be just as willing to obey God in every situation, even when that means embracing change and breaking with my old ways of thinking and acting.

What "new tricks" is God challenging you to embrace in this new year?