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Sometimes God must drive us to our knees before we look up to Him, helpless as small children.
It was several days since the worldwide coronavirus pandemic had been announced.
Schools had closed and we were dutifully isolating our whole family in our home.
“Say ‘I’m sorry,’” I remember telling my children when they were toddlers squabbling over toys.
“I’m sorry,” parroted the perpetrator, who sometimes had to repeat it a few times before exhibiting the requisite tone of remorse.
“Now say ‘I forgive you,’” I would tell the victim, who also parroted the phrase without completely understanding its meaning.
For years we have done this in our household, trying to explain to the children the importance of forgiveness. And yet, I myself was an adult before I understood its full meaning.
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Often what we want is different from what we need — or what is good for us.
Consider this recent exchange in my household, where we’ve been striving to be more health conscious.
“What would you like me to get at the grocery store?” I asked my husband, my pencil hovering over the grocery list.
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During my childhood, my family spent many summer days on a mile-long island on a lake in southeastern Wisconsin.
Boating, sailing, canoeing, fishing, waterskiing, tubing, and swimming were part of everyday life there. Knot tying, outdoor cooking, handling boats, hauling gear, reading the weather — all of these were a part of learning the value of hard work and gaining a deep appreciation of nature.
Among my many memories of the island there was someone who loved everyone on it.
Today my daughter was searching our house for a recorder, an instrument for her school music class.
Over the years we have acquired a couple of recorders, but, used by different children at various times for school, their whereabouts are not always known. (Yes, unfortunately things do get lost in our house sometimes.)
“Should we write a note to the teacher, saying we have a recorder, but we just don’t know where it is?” my daughter asked.
“No, we’ll find it,” I said, pulling open and peering into desk drawers in our home office. “Go look in your brother’s cubby.”
Today my daughter was searching our house for a recorder, an instrument for her school music class.
Over the years we have acquired a couple of recorders, but, used by different children at various times for school, their whereabouts are not always known. (Yes, unfortunately things do get lost in our house sometimes.)
“Should we write a note to the teacher, saying we have a recorder, but we just don’t know where it is?” my daughter asked.
“No, we’ll find it,” I said, pulling open and peering into desk drawers in our home office. “Go look in your brother’s cubby.”
My son made an announcement at supper the other night.
“So, I told my class that Dad is super good with math and physics and all that, but when somebody asked him to spell ‘cookie,’ he said ‘c-o-o-c-k-y.'”
Daddy’s fork stopped in midair.
“You told your whole class that?” he asked, his eyebrows raised.
“Go on without me!” I cried dramatically, my mud-soaked tennis shoes sliding helplessly along the slippery forest trail. “I’ll catch up!”
My family was on a backpacking trip heading toward a rustic cabin in the Porcupine Mountains in northern Michigan. The six of us each carried a backpack full of equipment we needed to survive the wilderness for a few days.
The other day I ran into an old friend at the grocery store.
She was behind me in the checkout line and as her eyes recognized mine, we both erupted into laughter of surprised reunion, as the memories of our past times together flooded my mind.
We laughed and chatted and updated each other, picking up from where we’d left off seven years ago.
Our Lord loves laughter. I know firsthand because He gave me my husband and my children, who bless me with the gift of laughter every day.
For example, they love to tease me good naturedly about my obsessive-compulsive tendencies regarding germs.
Since my children were babies, I’ve always been fastidious about everyone having clean hands.
So, when my husband was boarding an airplane for a work-related trip, I texted him to ask if he remembered to sanitize his hands after getting settled in his seat.
