Kingdom Hearts

Do you think America needs a drug problem today?  I do.  Most definitely, I do.  Here is a small article that I thought was very interesting.  I do not know who wrote the article but perhaps this is at least somewhat indicative of what we need more of in our society today:

I had a drug problem when I was young. 

• I was drug to church on Sunday mornings.   
• I was drug to weddings and funerals.
• I was drug to family reunions.
• I was drug to Grandpa’s ranch to work during summers.
• I was drug out the door to go to school every week day.
• I was drug by the ears when I was disrespectful to adults and teachers.
• I was drug to the woodshed when I disobeyed my parents.

Those drugs are still in my veins.  And they affect my behavior in everything I do, say, and think.  They are stronger than cocaine, crack, or heroin.  And if today’s children had this kind of drug problem, America might be a better place.

—Author Unknown

My parents, in raising me, were not perfect.  I can say this with little apprehension because I think they would tell you the same thing.  But they were faithful and loyal parents.  And for that I am grateful.  They laid down expectations for me, although I did not always do a very good job in meeting them.  But one thing that was consistent, was when I was disrespectful, there was a consequence.  When I was disobedient, I was fully “informed” that such was not acceptable.   When I did not want to go to church, I was “drug” anyway.  I was expected to call friends of theirs, “Mr.” and “Mrs.” and to say “yes ma’am” and “no sir.”  And if not, I was “drug;” sometimes even by the ears.

Parents, let us make sure that we are providing our children with the upbringing they need.  It is our responsibility: not the school’s or daycare’s responsibility, the babysitter’s responsibility, nor the church youth leader’s responsibility.  Parents must take it upon themselves to teach their children right from wrong, through both instruction and example.  God has placed that responsibility upon us as parents (Ephesians 6:4).  As a parent, I try my best to let my ”kids be kids.”  However, I also believe that it is my God-given responsibility to guide them into their adulthood.  Sometimes that makes me the proverbial “bad guy.”  But hopefully in the long run, these precious boys will see me as at least a “pretty good guy.”

Our children are not only the future of our society, but they are the present!  It has to start now.  Solomon told us, “train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it” (Proverbs 22:6).

Chase, our youngest, a 4 year old, is going through a lot of phases right now.  One is asking questions.  He loves to talk.  Often times, I wonder to myself, “will this kid ever just shut up?”  We were going fishing Friday and so earlier in the day, I was outside putting line on the poles and getting the hooks on; basically getting everything “ready to go.”  There was a bombardment of questions. 

“Dad, is this your pole?” “Where is my pole?” “Dad, am I going to fish?” “Hey Dad, is this pole brown?”  “Hey Dad, are the trees blowing?” “Hey Dad, are those birds up there?” “Hey Dad, are we going to eat hot dogs” “Dad, where’s the bait?” Dad, are Aaron and I going to have to share?” “Dad, when are we going?”  Are we going tomorrow too?” “What time do we have to come home?” ”Dad, do we need rain?” 

Just question after question after question.  I love this kid and I am glad that he is curious enough to ask questions and desire conversation with his daddy.  Even if it does drive me crazy and make me want to scream at the top of my lungs at times.  Another phase he is going through currently, and I don’t take as well to this one, is taking my things.  He means no ill will; but he wants to be like daddy.  He doesn’t want his toy keys.  He has no desire to play with his “toy” wallet.  He wants the real thing.  So he takes mine and apparently forgets to put it back where it belongs.  So a couple of times this week, I have had to go on mad searches through the house, looking for my wallet.  After finding it yesterday, Chase and I had a little “talk,” and I can only hope that this little “phase” is nipped in the bud.  However, I have my doubts.  As irritating as it is though, thank God He has blessed me with a child that loves me and wants to be like me.  Now let’s just hope I can fulfill my responsibility and give him a good example to follow on the important matters.

But here is another phase Chase is currently experiencing that I have taken very well to.  In fact, so much so, that I realize that I need to do a better job adopting it myself.  He loves.  And he loves unconditionally.  In the midst of all his questions and talking, he consistently stops to say, “I love you.’  Not just to me.  Not just to Cody.  Not just to Aaron.  He says it to everybody.    Last week when we were at Walmart he walked up to a stranger and said it to someone he had never seen.  Saturday he said it to our neighbor.  He loves.

I remember my parents telling me about a similar phase I went through in life.  Now I am left to wonder, what happened?  What changes as we grow from innocent childhood to adulthood?  As an adult, I go through a lot of phases too.  Hopefully love will be a phase I can adopt again and hold on to it. 

There’s no wonder Jesus tells us to become like little children (Matthew 18:1-4).  He also reminds us as kingdom citizens that we are identified by our love for one another (John 13:35).  Our love is how people know we are Christians.

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.  Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.  In this  the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him.  In this is love, not that we have loved God, but he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitation for our sins.  Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.  No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us (1 John 4:7-11).

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude.  It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful, it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.  Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  Love never ends… (1 Corinthians 13:4-8).

Lord, be with us all as we strive to adopt this phase of love and maintain it.

Peace!

I am sitting here in my chair with the TV on and reading.  Makes a lot of sense, right?  I know, I know.  It’s a guy thing, I think.  Anyway, a commercial came on that got my attention.  It used to be one of my favorite commercials but I hadn’t seen it in a while.  It has a grown man and at first all you can see is his face.  And he is making these funny noises; sound effects.  And you can tell from his movements that he is emulating a sword fight of some type.  It is hilarious looking.  Then the screen expands to where you can see the whole picture and what he is doing is pretending to sword fight with his little boy in the front yard, who looks to be about 5 or 6 years old.  Then there is a caption at the bottom of the screen that says:

“IT TAKES A REAL MAN TO BE A DAD!”

Awesome commercial!  So that made me start thinking of things I love to do with Aaron and Chase.  Here are a few:

• Fishing
• Throwing the ball around outside (and inside when mom’s not home).
• Wrestling
• Playing Wii.  This is a relatively new one but we are having a blast.
• Making cinammon toast with them at night time after Cody tells them its bedtime.
• Tickling them.  This is for purely selfish reasons on my part.  There is just nothing quite like listening to the laughter of little boys….especially when they laugh so hard they lose their breath, snort, or…. well I won’t go there.
• Reading the Bible with them.
• Singing and praying with them.  I especially love to listen to them pray.  Wonderful!

And all of these are definitely things I don’t do with them nearly enough.  As a dad who has so much to learn, I would be curious to hear some things you enjoy doing with your kids.  I’m always looking for new and more creative ideas as I strive to be a better dad.

I was given a dose of the cold, hard truth this morning. Let me relay to you my conversation this morning with my 6 year old, as I walked in the house coming back from the gym.

Aaron: “Good morning Dad.”

Jason: “Hey bud, good morning. How did you sleep?”

Aaron: “I slept well. I love you.”

Jason: (my head is swelling w/ pride) “Well, I love you too.”

I rub his head in a manly kind of way, trying to be affectionate somewhat, as I didn’t want to hug him; I was sweaty.

Aaron: “I’m hungry, can you fix me some breakfast. Mom’s still in bed with Chase.”

Jason: (Chuckling and now realizing why he just told me he loved me). “Sure, buddy. Do you want sausage biscuits?”

Aaron: “Yes”

After a long pause while I am fixing his breakfast and turning my coffee pot on…

Aaron: “I know who in our family is cute.”

Jason: (Wondering where in the world this came from) “Oh really! Who here is cute?”

Aaron: “Fritz!” (this is our little mini-schnauzer)

Jason: “You think so? Well, I think I’m cute. What do you think about that?”

Aaron: “Well, sorta I guess. I think the order goes like this: Fritz, me, mommy, Chase, Hank, and then you.”

Ouch! Sometimes the truth really hurts…..

I think we have all read articles, heard sermons, or have seen bulletins that discuss the prayers of children. Well, tonight Cody and I had our first true experience of being torn between laughing and scratching our heads. We knew it would eventually happen. We have heard too many stories from others to not realize it was coming.

Ponder upon Aaron’s prayer tonight: “Dear Heavenly Father, thank you so much for our family. And thank you for hospitals. And for the post office. And for the fire station. And for the circus. In Jesus name, Amen!”

Hmmm! It was tough to feel that I had to fake a cough attack so as to not give it away that I was laughing.

But here is what I find so amazing about this whole moment. And when you think about it, this really teaches us so much. As funny as it might be, our precious boy actually prayed for some things that I don’t. The innocent and thoughtful mind of a 6-year old prayed for important things in this life that are just as much in need of prayers as anything or anyone else. Often times, we find ourselves so busy in life, we don’t even think of some things like this.

“Father and Creator in Heaven, you are indeed an awesome God. I cannot thank you enough for blessing me with 2 beautiful boys that teach me so much about life. Thank you for a 6-year old who is able to teach me that all people and all things are important and worthy of prayer. And thank you for the heart of a sweet little boy that wants to pray and tries to see the good in others. Help me to be more like Him.”

I wrote this a few months back when my wife had to leave town for a couple of days and I kept the boys by myself. They taught me a great lesson.

Yesterday was an interesting day at the office. First, I am by myself with the boys this week, as my wife needed to go to East Texas to get the house ready for her dad. While in Iraq he had a stroke, and has been in a hospital in Germany for the past week. Well, he returned home Monday evening and Cody went to go help her mom tend to him for a couple of days. She should be back today or tomorrow. My father in law is expected to make a full recovery and right now his plans are to return to Iraq in about 3 weeks. He is doing well but please pray for him.

In any event, I mention this because the boys are with me this week. It makes for an interesting day at the office as they are running and playing all throughout the church building while I study in my office. The biggest challenge is keeping them out of the baptistry.

Well yesterday, a young woman, twenty three years of age, came by the church building and wanted some counseling. I invited her in and we sat in the auditorium and talked for a considerable amount of time. This young woman’s world is absolutely falling apart. She is sick and because of her sickness, her fiance left her. Her parents are divorcing, which cannot be easy for any twenty-three year old, much less for one who is experiencing a separation of her own. Her sister is strung out on drugs. And she has no money and insisted on me not giving her any. In addition to all of this, she does not like her job and wants to move to Austin to get a better job but her father absolutely forbids it, even though she is an adult. A lot of this, of course, has to do with her culture. So as I sat and listened to her, she was sobbing quite heavily.

I have experienced moments like this, but this time was a bit different. My kids were running around the auditorium and foyer, playing and laughing while all of this was happening. I tried to get them to go elsewhere and play but it was to no avail. Finally, my youngest, a 3-year old, came up to her and gave her a hug and patted her on the back and asked if she will be okay. He had never even seen this woman before. He had no idea who she was and he did not particularly care. As I sat there in awe, she burst out with laughter and told me that I will never know what that meant to her. I’m sure Chase will not either, but it sure made his daddy proud. He helped this young lady in a way that I could not.

After she left, I went to ask the boys if they were ready to go get some lunch and Aaron, my oldest, a 5-year old, was teary-eyed himself. I asked him what was wrong and he said he was sad because that girl was sad. Again, I was awe-struck. I have two precious boys that have tremenous hearts of compassion. May I do my best to instill in them the drive to keep it.

But while the temptation exists for me to point out my children as unique in that regard, I really don’t think they are. They are indeed special, and I couldn’t be more proud of them. But I believe for the most part, all children have hearts of gold and the type of compassion for which all of us should strive.

In Matthew 18:3-5, our Lord stated, “I assure you, unless, you are converted and become like chldren, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child–this one is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever welcomes one child like this in My name welcomes Me.”

I am grateful for children in this world. They truly are a blessing. And I am especially thankful that God has given me two of them to raise, witness, and learn from each and every day.

Sunday morning, between Bible Class and worship, I was visiting with people in the auditorium as I always do, and one of my friends asked me how my weekend had gone. For some reason, I did not respond right away. I wasn’t sure how to answer the question. On one level, it was one of the toughest weekends I have had to experience. But it was also a wonderful weekend filled with great things. The only way I could describe it to the person who asked was, “it was a roller coaster ride of emotion, but I wouldn’t change a thing.”

Last week, early Wednesday morning, someone in the congregation had passed away from a heart ailment. He was 25 years old. He was a great young man who in spite of his illness, had a heart of gold, and served God. I had the privilege of spending quality time with the family up the point of the funeral and I was glad I did. It helped me in my efforts in conducting the funeral service, but I also believe it helped the family in a therapeutic kind of way, to verbalize and process their hurt. The funeral went well I suppose….I guess about as well as a funeral can go. I was amazed at the strength and faith of the family. I can’t begin to imagine what it would be like to say goodbye to one of my precious boys. From a selfish standpoint, I hope I never have to experience it. I don’t want me and Cody to hurt like I saw this family hurt. But while it hurt this family immensely to say goodbye to their beloved 25-year old son, there was no doubt in their minds that they would one day be reunited with him. Their faith in God was incredible. I learned a valuable lesson in being around them; there will be a day in which every single one of us, if we have not experienced it already, will have to say goodbye and “let go” of someone while on this earth. And may our trust in God be strong and unwavering when it happens. Because it will hurt. And the temptation will surface to be angry and confused. The amazing thing was that the family wanted me to mention this in the service. They wanted their situation to benefit others. I ask that you please pray for this family in the coming days, weeks, and months. It will be tough for them. But I am confident that because God is the awesome refuge that He is, and because of the strength and faith of this family, they will be okay. They told me repeatedly, that they wouldn’t a change a thing, because their loved one is now in a better place, and that he is no longer sick. They wouldn’t change a thing. Wow!

Well, after the funeral and gravesite service, we had plans to be in Victoria that evening. My parents were taking us all out to dinner at a fancy (not to mention expensive) restaraunt in Victoria, Olde Victoria. It is a beautiful place on the 12th floor of the plaza center in downtown Victoria. Joining us would be the parents, myself, Cody, the boys, Megan (my sister), and her boyfriend Matt. Mom spinned it off to my little sister that it was the only time all of us would be around during the holidays so she wanted to buy us all dinner so we could be together. It was a wonderful time. Well, unbeknownst to Megan, Matt was planning to propose to her in front of the family. He waited until we got back out to the house and did it. It was touching. Cody got it all on video, so we will soon get it posted here on the website, once we get Matt and Megan’s permission to do it. Matt is a good guy, and I will be gaining a great brother-in-law. I am glad that my sister will be in good hands with someone who loves her and will always cherish her. She deserves it! We got home around 11:00 PM Saturday night, got the kids to bed. I slept soundly that night as I was obviously very tired.

So Sunday morning rolls around, and I am up early as I usually am on Sunday mornings, looking over my lessons that I have prepared for the day. And my phone rings at about 7 AM and it is a dear friend who I had not spoken to in almost a year. We talked for about 20 minutes. It was good to hear from him and it absolutely made my day… and weekend.

Then the highlight of the weekend came after morning worship. Some people in the congregation, about a month ago, began to think of something they could do for a group of underprivileged children, including adults who are residents at a home for mentally disabled. And what they did, was met a couple of Wednesday nights ago and decorated stockings. The kids in the congregation drew a person’s name and were to give a stocking filled with various “goodies” to the individual of whose name they drew. We had a luncheon for them yesterday in their honor after our morning worship where the stockings were exchanged. What a hit! The smiles on their faces said it all. The joy and pride seen in their eyes, as they were reminded of how important they are to us and that they were made to feel like a part of our family, was priceless. But amazingly, to me, that wasn’t the biggest part that sticks out in my mind. As I watched the kids interract with them, it hit me that they were visiting with these people moreso than the adults. And as I sat and watched what was happening, it was the youth in the congregation that were being the example to the adults, as eventually we adults began to interract as well. Again, I am reminded of Matthew 18 when Jesus charges us to become like children. I was proud of our kids and I think the parents have a great reason to be overjoyed with what their children accomplished. I hope that they learned a lot from the experience. I did, undoubtedly. It is meaningful because it was the people who were socially unaccepted in society that Jesus actually reached out to. It is a reminder to me that the kingdom is in reality an entity that is available for all, not merely for socially, economic, or religious elitists. And although the kingdom is within the grasp of all man, including the underprivileged, they may never possess it, if we don’t get out and introduce it to them. Last I checked, people are not knocking on our doors asking us to introduce Jesus to them. We are the ones who need to get out and do it. I saw that in our youth group and their parents yesterday.

Also, it is in the plans of our youth in the near future, hopefully during the holidays, to make a trip to Central Texas Children’s Home, for a day and spend some time with the children there, playing games, watching movies, etc. I am happy to serve in a congregation with people who have kingdom hearts. The people here in La Grange have taught me a lot. May all of us continue to grow in our efforts to develop hearts like Jesus…. and may we continue to do our very best to live our lives as Jesus would live it if He were in our place.

What a weekend!