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A Porter family experienced a Christmas miracle when a beloved dog they had given up for dead rejoined the family.

Brownie is a 5-year-old Lab mix that belongs to Lucas Newman, 12.

The story starts in July when Brownie had an altercation with a neighborhood goat.

He was cut from his belly up to his right shoulder.

The family rushed Brownie to Mountain Highway Veterinary Hospital, 2216 E. Lamar Alexander Parkway, Maryville.

There it took a minimum of 30 stitches to sew Brownie up, said Brenda Newman, the mother of Lucas, a seventh grader at Heritage Middle School.

The family took him home and he was put in a play house to recuperate. It was hot and Brownie decided he did not want to stay in the play house, so he broke free, also breaking loose all his stitches and added another gash on top of it, Brenda said.

So it was back to the vet for Brownie.

He was sewn up again and placed in a kennel to wait for the family to come take him home.

A vet hospital employee opened the door to take out the trash at the same time that another employee had taken Brownie out of his kennel to clean it. The apparently spooked dog almost knocked over the woman taking out the trash, jolted out the door and disappeared.

Brenda said the family was on the way to pick up Brownie when they got a call informing them that he had escaped.

The vet hospital had people looking for Brownie for six weeks, put up fliers from Morningview Village all the way to Maryville College and sent e-mails to other vets to be on the alert for Brownie.

"We just thought he had either succumbed to his injury or had crawled off and died. Perhaps something else was wrong with him," Brenda said.

"Lucas was resolved to the fact that his dog was gone," she said.

"Sunday (Dec. 13) Lucas's dad, Jim Newman, had picked Lucas up from a Scout camping trip and gone to AutoZone to get some vehicle parts," Brenda said.

At AutoZone, "a brown dog came up to Jim wagging its tail and sniffing around him. Lucas said that looks like my dog," she recalled.

The dog was much skinnier than the overweight Brownie had been. The only way to tell if it was Brownie was to pull up his fur. They then discovered the scar going all the way up his side.

"Lucas dropped to his knees, hugged the dog and said 'I missed you.' He knew it was his dog," Brenda said.

"All that was wrong with him was a little cut on his paw. That incision had healed up beautifully," she said.

"Lucas thinks this is a real Christmas miracle. He had prayed that his dog would come back," Brenda said. "This is a once-in-a-lifetime thing. What are the odds that you would find your dog on the other end of town?"