Last night about 45 min. after our daughter Laura was supposed to be asleep...she came back down the stairs.
Laura: "Mom--aren't you just SO excited you can hardly believe it?"
Me: (thinking to myself...what am I forgetting that I should be unbelievably excited about!!!???)
Laura: (continuing) "I can't wait! I can't wait! I can't wait!"
Me: (pause...not wanting to wreck the joy of her excitement with the impossible notion that I have no clue what she is talking about) "I'm pretty excited...(is that a lie?...pause)...but...what are you MOST excited about?"
Laura: "TOMORROW WE GET TO GO TO THE BREAD FACTORY!!!!!"
Me: (slowly remembering that I volunteered to go with Laura's 2nd grade class to tour the Franz Bread Factory on Thursday afternoon) "Yeah...that is going to be so much fun! I can't wait!"...(and now I actually am excited because it's so cute to see her that excited about her bread factory field trip).
The whole dialogue made me think of a talk by Ravi Zacharias that Jason and I listened to last fall...our friend Andrew recommended it...it was really good. In it he talks about how little kids come to everything with this amazing, beautiful God-given sense of wonder.
When they see a seed sprout's tiny blade stretching through the mulch, they are awed.
When the first flakes of snow begin to settle, they are glued to the window.
A max train that can actually go under the ground, through a tunnel and come out on the other side just blows them away.
It's a good thing.
Last year, our son Cavan was so intrigued by the worms that appeared each morning when we were ready to head to school, that he "collected" them for over 6 weeks in the fabric pocket on the back of the driver's seat in our van. We only discovered his collection after searching every inch of the van to find the cause of the horrible, putrid stench (I still sometimes think I can smell rotting worms in there).
In his talk, Ravi explains how we can lose this sense of wonder over time.
I see this when I watch our kids respond to Jason's stories at bedtime. A few weeks ago "Timmy" (the kid who is always the main character of their ongoing sequels)...was trying to send his pet mouse into space in a rocket launcher...for full effect...Jason kept pausing just at the moment when Timmy was going to push the button to launch the rocket. He did this about 10 times and finally I gave him the "it's WAY past their bedtime look". I clearly was not "awed" by the treacherous, impending danger that poor little "Mr. Fooziwinks" was about to face.
Finally... just at the moment when Timmy was once again about to push the button sky-rocketing the poor little mouse into oblivion (don't worry, Fooziwinks was attached to a safety parachute just in case the rocket exploded)...the tension in the room was thick...and as Timmy's finger finally began applying pressure to the red launch button....Colson covered his eyes and screamed "I CAN'T WATCH ANYMORE !!!!"
I love that full-self, all-emotions, no-holding-back investment that little kids give.
It's that kind of wonder that I miss...that I want...about things like nature and stories and playing superheroes...and mostly about God.
There's a reason God told us we have to come to Him as a child does.
There's a reason Jesus was so willing to welcome little children to Him.
And that's one reason I love spending time with little kids.
They haven't lost the wonder.
And they express it.
About a month ago, I was working in Cavan's kindergarten classroom and his teacher had the kids put their heads down on their desks as they prepared for their next project, designing mittens that were supposed to have matching patterns.
She kept saying over and over "Now I want you to rest your heads and think about mittens...think about the pattern you want to draw on your matching mittens...remember....you should be thinking about mittens"
One little guy was obviously having a hard time sitting still...
She again reminded "Right now you should be thinking MITTENS...what your mittens are going to look like."
His hand popped up into the air and she finally called on him (in the patient sweet voice that I think God gives only to kindergarten teachers).
Mrs. Wheeler: "What's the problem _______?"
He said (with a voice full of true distress): "But I just can't stop thinking about CHEESE !!!"
I'm not sure how that totally relates, but for me...it's that honest, lay-it-on-the-table side of little kids that I just love so much.
And they are that way with God too.
They know He knows what they are thinking anyway....so when they pray...they just go ahead and say it.
Anyway--Ravi has a new book out that I want to read; it's called "Recapture the Wonder" It asks, "How can we live in such a way that the humdrum fuses with the spectacular? How does one take the emotional high points and successfully balance them with the sharp edges of sorrow that are also part of life? How can we find the sweetness of that knowledge,capture that truth and recapture the wonder as our creator intended?"
I'll let you know if it helps...
