by Tad Lindley
Have you ever been on an Alaska Airlines flight and you take your seat and then you see a dog come down the aisle accompanying its owner? Or perhaps you have been in a restaurant somewhere and a family comes in and as they walk past your table you see that they have brought a full size husky with them into the restaurant and it is now laying under the table licking the crumbs up off the floor. It’s possible that these dogs even had a vest on that read in all capital letters, “SERVICE DOG.” You readers are probably better than me, but I have been in these situations and something about the behavior of the dog caused me to think, “Yeah, right, that’s not a service dog, they’re just bringing a pet on the plane!”
True service dogs
I have loved the dogs that I have had as pets, but I never took them to a restaurant. I grew up in a time and place where only true service dogs ever went into public places, like schools, restaurants, and airplanes. The majority of these were seeing eye dogs for the blind and visually impaired. Once I flew in a plane with a cadaver-locating dog in my row. Those are true service dogs. They have been trained at costs of tens of thousands of dollars to do very specific jobs, and they deserve every privilege that the Americans with Disabilities Acts (ADA) gives them.
Fake service dogs
Unfortunately the ADA only allows airlines, restaurants, and other public institutions two very specific questions about service animals. Neither of those is, “Can you prove that this dog is a service animal?” And so any of us can buy a SERVICE DOG vest on Amazon and put it on our pet and walk into a restaurant or any other public place and go unchallenged about our lie. Oftentimes these dogs are easy to spot, because they do not behave like service animals. (Except in the case of drug, bomb, and cadaver dogs) they do not sniff people, objects, or other dogs. Service animals will never beg for food. They will never pull their owners when they are on a leash. You can find a full list of signs of fake service animals online.
This isn’t really about service dogs is it?
If you have read my column much, you know that I am going to tie this into the Bible. But how? Just like there are behavioral signs that betray fake service dogs, there are behavioral standards and signs that can help us to spot service Christians and fake Christians. Now remember Jesus said, Just not lest we be judged? (Matthew 7:1) Does this mean we cannot study other people and look for the signs of godliness in their lives? The answer to that is not far down the page. In Matthew 7:15-16, Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits… This indicates that we need to study people to see the fruits of their life. Wherefore by their fruits you shall know them. (Matthew 7:20)
Signs of a service Christian
If you have ever observed a service dog at work, you know that you see a poise and an execution of behaviors that are different from a pet dog. The same is true for Christians. Here are the signs that would indicate that a person is a true service Christian: the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering [patience], gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness [humility], temperance [self-control]: against such there is no law. (Galatians 5:22-23) When you see that fruit in a person’s life, it is a strong indicator that they are the real thing.
Signs of a fake Christian
Imagine that you sat down in an aisle seat on the flight to Anchorage and here comes a service dog pulling its owner up the aisle until it gets to your row, stops, sniffs your hand, and then licks it. Hopefully you see several red flags here that this is not a real service animal. In the same way, there are red flags in the Bible that would indicate that a person is not serving God, these are the fruits of the flesh. Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. (Galatians 5:19-21)
Who do you know that needs to read this?
You may have thought to yourself, “I hope Reverend X reads this, because I saw him stumbling out of a cab the other day!” Or, “I’m going to put this where my wife can see it, and I’m going to circle the part about patience. She needs to read that!” Actually though, I did not write this for other people. I wrote it for you and me. That we might examine our own lives and ask ourselves, “When others examine my life, will they see the fruit of the Spirit, or the fruit of the flesh?”
Reverend Tad Lindley is a minister at the Bethel United Pentecostal Church in Bethel, Alaska.
