Dennis was uneasy. One minute, he had been sleeping soundly, enjoying a real "catnap". The next, wide awake, he had a sudden sense of something wrong.
The night was quiet. Around him the household slept; his ears flicking forward could hear nothing but normal night noises. But something was definitely WRONG.
His nose twitched uncomfortably. The air was not right; it was heavy, breathless, acrid—smoky!
Dennis ran on furry paws to seek Brenda. She was sleeping, but this was an emergency! leaping on the bed, he howled his best and loudest howls—and being part Siamese, they were very loud indeed.
Startled out of a sound sleep, Brenda found the determined cat on her chest voicing his alarm, and the apartment filled with smoke. Catching up two-year-old Kimberly, and Dennis, she fled the apartment in time.
The firefighters soon arrived and found the source of the smoke: a forgotten pot was smoldering in the kitchen. The captain credited Dennis with saving their lives. "Most fire deaths are caused when people are overcome by smoke," he said.
A grateful Brenda promised Dennis he would have "shrimp every day for a week!"
Yes, even though Dennis had clawed at her chest, howled in her ears and spoiled her comfortable sleep, Dennis had saved her life. And we are trying hard to rouse you today, but for a far greater purpose: to save your soul.
It isn't comfortable to be waked from sleep by a shout of warning; it's pretty scary to find a quiet and peaceful life suddenly threatened, to realize that death and eternity are ahead, but how wonderful to be waked in time!
Brenda saw her danger, and escaped in time. To have waited might have cost her life, but if you delay and wait "just a little longer" before deciding for Christ, it may cost your soul.