Reading to my Children

"Dad, this book is much more interesting than the last book you were reading to us," Anna said.

"I think technically it's the same book," I said.  "It's just that it is so long that they broke it up into three parts."

"Maybe so," Anna said.  "But the first part was kind of boring."

My children and I are in the process of reading the Lord of the Rings -- probably mostly because I enjoy it.  We just finished "The Fellowship of the Ring" and started "The Two Towers."

"Mom says that the Lord of the Rings is an 'Allergy,'" Vince proclaimed sagely.  "Sauron is sort of like the devil and the ring is like sin."

"Hmm," I said.  "I think the word is actually Allegory."

Elliot decided to put his two cents in.  "I think that the Lord of the Rings is telling us that it is bad to wear jewelry!"

With those words of wisdom, the conversation turned to other subjects.

I have read the Lord of the Rings several times.  If there is a unifying theme in the book, it is that small people, without great power, but with courage can change the world.  Regardless, the book can simply be read as a long story about another world.

I'm afraid that many people read the Bible the way that my children are listening to Tolkein's masterpiece.  Page by page they search for hidden meanings, struggling over prophetic passages with their weird symbolism and imagery.

The thing is that the important messages of the Bible are said very clearly.  Sure, there are passages that are difficult to understand, but there are a lot more that are like John 13:35 where Jesus said, "By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another."

The problem isn't that we don't understand the whole Bible.  The problem is that we aren't very good at putting into practice the things we do understand.

All we are called to do is to live the things we comprehend.  That's enough, even if there are a few things in Scripture that never become as clear as the "Allergy" the Lord of the Rings.

Artistry

My wife Elaine draws better than I do.  She can sketch houses and put the sun, complete with rays coming out of them.  She can draw rabbits and cats and a number of other things which you can actually identify after the fact.

When I draw things, it is usually tough to figure out what I've drawn.  (Maybe that's why she's so much better at Pictionary than I am).  I often try to sketch things for my patients to explain some medical thing, but I'm never sure if my drawings help. 

A picture may be worth a thousands words, but I'm afraid most of mine are only worth about twelve and a half.

If I am truthful though, neither one of us is a great artist.  Rembrandt and Michelangelo would have nothing to fear from either of us from an artistry standpoint (although Elaine can bake a far better pie than any of the Renaissance artists could have).

There are different levels of drawing and certainly I am closer to the bottom than the top.  At the same time, if I compare my abilities to my three year old, Victoria's abilities, I am an amazing artist.

I am afraid our human tendency is to compare ourselves to others who are worse than us and then to over value our own skills.  This can lead to the belief that we don't need God's guidance in our lives.

Nothing could be farther from the truth.

What actually ends up happening in this situation is that we do our own thing until we run into trouble and then call on Him to bail us out.  Even if we don't get into trouble, we don't experience the blessings we would have following Him.

God is the master designer and architect.  He sees the future as clearly as He does the present.  He knows the end just as well as He does the beginning.  More than that, He knows the people that He wants you and me to become.

We won't get there by following our own way or believing our skills to be more than they are.  We will get there by placing our hand in the hand of our Father and walking with Him wherever He wants to go.

A Million Bananas

"Dad, you know what?"  My son, Vince, asked me.

I generally have no idea what wisdom my son will impart to me.  Often it is some tidbit of information from the plant or animal kingdom, or perhaps some historical fact about the Reformation.  Not today...

"I don't know Vince, what?"  I asked him.

"One banana is better than a million bananas if you are someone who doesn't like bananas!"  He said emphatically.

(Vince doesn't like bananas).

Of course, this statement could be true for any food or activity you don't like.  Even for things you do enjoy, there is some extreme that would just be "too much."  I do like bananas, but one million of them just sounds like a mess to me.

Some level of moderation and variety in life adds quite a bit of spice to it.

There are a few areas where extreme levels are to be encouraged and even desired.  Love and kindness come to mind.  Most other things -- even lobster and chocolate -- have their limits.

I'm afraid our human tendency is to push ourselves full bore into things that just don't matter that much.  Jesus was different.  In John 13 it says, "...having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end."

It wasn't love of money or love of things or desire for power that drove Jesus.  What motivated Him was a love for His disciples and for us today.  His was a love that was more extreme than any love that we have known.

I would pray that that each one of us would learn the important things in life.  There really are only a few things that it is worth getting "extreme" about, but for those we should give our all.

Jesus gave His life because of love for us.  Can we do less for Him?

Eating Cake

I watched with great interest as the little boy across from me ate his birthday cake.  Carefully he scraped every bit of icing off of the top and sides (he had specifically asked for a piece with a rose on it for extra frosting).  It made a small mound on his plate beside his, suddenly unclothed, piece of chocolate cake.

Then, like the wolf swallowing the duck in Peter and the Wolf, he swallowed it all in just two mouthfuls.

He licked his lips and inspected his cake.  No, there was no other icing to be seen.  "Mom," he announced a moment later.  "I'm full.  Can I go out and play?"

I suppose it isn't an unusual thought that there are three ways to eat cake, the same as there are three ways to Oreos.  There are those who scrape off their icing and eat it first, there are those who scrape off their icing and eat it last, and then there are those "mature" eaters who eat the whole lot together.

Well, and then there are a few miserable souls who don't eat cake at all because it would be bad for their figure.  But of those, we will not speak.

It doesn't really matter how you eat your cake, but it does seem to me that people tend to take the same ideas to the ways in which they break down every day tasks as they do to ingesting cake.  There are those who save their hardest chores for last, those who do them first, and those who do a mixture of them.

I tend to be of the personality to get the hardest things out of the way with first, but there is really something to be said for doing a mixture.  Spending extended time grinding away on things we don't enjoy, without an occasional break with something we like, will wear any one of us down.

Ecclesiastes tells us "Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might..."  Enjoyable tasks, jobs that are just a grind require the same commitment.

All your might...

That is the challenge.  It is easy to go full bore at things we enjoy doing, but not so easy to work through jobs that we don't -- particularly not to do them with all our strength and focus.

It might be nice to have no hard, onerous tasks, but that is not the way of things.  Most of the time, we have to finish our green beans before we can even look at our cake -- regardless of whether or not it has icing.

Regardless of how we separate our jobs out through each day, let us work at them with a will.  Those who only eat cake are bound to have some nutritional deficiencies later on in life.