but now the world in
general has moved on. it has washed its hands of anything spiritual that it
calmly tolerates between Thanksgiving and New Year's, and is now free to focus
on itself and the fulfillment of every temporal desire. except if it takes too much effort. heaven forbid we work too hard to keep all
those vain promises we made to ourselves two weeks ago. i already see myself
"editing" my goals for this year, and i know in about 3 weeks the
gyms are going to be much less crowded, fast food restaurants will have more
business and credit card debts will just keep going up as budgets (caloric and
monetary) are abandoned by the wayside and promises broken, even the ones
recycled from last year's New Year's.
the general response is to repeat the plan and wait 12 months to fail
again. i'l doing good just to keep the clutter under control!
for some reason,
it's only on the busiest days when i have the least spare time that i go into
over-achiever mode and tear through the to-do list like a rabid porcupine.
(bunny trail: i've never seen a rabid porcupine, nor any porcupine at all in
the vicinity of a to-do list). i usually start in the master bath/closet, work
my way through the bedroom and then the living room/dining room before tackling
the kitchen. it usually doesn't even
take too long, as i time myself by episodes of Friends, which serves both as a
timer and a mood-elevator, keeping things perky while i scrub, move, fold,
organize, put away, hide, shove, burn, demolish….
BUT ANYWAY.
the past two months
i've been covering for the Cubbies' lead teacher, and i have had a blast with
the crowd of 4 year olds. this past
month surrounding Christmas we have been learning about Noah, the unit theme
being "God Keeps His Promises." and while Noah's story only takes up a couple
paragraphs of Scripture, the other several thousand pages of the Bible teach us
not only about so many other promises that God keeps, but also what our
response should be. the Christian life
is a two-way thing, which is great
because that's just how i love to teach these lil' charmers! it just so happens that the promises He made
to Noah come along with an absolutely epic story that serves as a perfect segue
to even bigger and bolder promises, and bigger and bolder responses.
did i mention that i
was an over-achiever?
for a 4-year old, a
summary of our lesson would look like this:
we are sinners- but
so was Noah.
He promised to punish sin, because He is holy
and perfect and completely just to do so… just like He promised the flood to
punish the evil
He also promised to send a Savior, just like He
promised to rescue Noah and his family, unworthy and sinful though they were.
and He promised to keep us safe if we trust in Him
like Noah did.
i totally got this-
i can keep on going, but i think you get the point ;)
and every single one
of these, and His other, promises are completely true.
"God keeps His promises" are 4 short words
that are easy enough to get a pre-K child to say, but harder than it seems to
get an adult to believe and respond rightly to.
if i were in Noah's
neighborhood, i can't say for certain that i wouldn't have been one of the evil
guys laughing at the crazy nut-job building a gigantic boat in the middle of
arid wilderness. they thought he was stupid. they literally thought the guy had lost it.
the kids just
laughed because their teacher said the word "stupid."
but for up to a
hundred years, Noah was the idiot farmer/gardener-turned-shipbuilder who they
probably thought was either dehydrated or intoxicated.
can you imagine believing a promise like that for a
hundred years? we can't even trust
ourselves to exercise regularly for a month or two, but Noah had enough faith
to trust an unpopular Deity's unpopular promise, even though it required a
career change, personality change, reputation change and logistics out the
wazoo. the Noah that woke up that
crazy day was NOT the same Noah that went to bed that night. i'm having fun right now, imagining their
family conversation over dinner, as Noah tries to casually bring up the subject
of impending doom.
Noah: so, honey… God said He's gonna wipe out
all mankind and every living being that draws breath…
Mrs Noah: say what?!?
Noah: um, yeah- but it's okay-we're not gonna die...just everybody
else. God says He's going to save us!
Mrs Noah: huh.
did He, now? and how's He going
to do that?
Noah: with a boat.
Mrs Noah: a boat...
Noah: yup- A BOAT. a big one!!
Mrs. Noah: oh good. a 600 year old farmer's building us a
boat. we're doomed.
but build it he
did. and it's so much cooler than any
joke of a movie about this faith champ. (at least Russell Crowe remembered to
include a boat, even if he forgot EVERYTHING else).
God made a promise,
Noah believed it, and he knew that his response could only be to pick up that
hammer and start working. he drafted his
sons, he found many, many gopher trees, i don't know what educational material
he had access to but he found something, and he went hammering away. he tuned out the jokes and whistles from the
bored, evil bystanders. he smiled and
replaced the vandalism and sabotage from the evil teenagers. he used the evil junkmail as blueprint. i'm
thinking that as the project turned into a reality, he came to regret every
joke or harsh word he'd ever said about his evil mother-in-law or evil neighbor
or evil politician. every board he sawed was a reminder of God's coming
judgement on everybody he knew- and also his own salvation. if they'd have asked, i bet he would have
negotiated with God to give some animal's room to a repentant friend (do we
really need opossums? could we let them
float and take the Smith family with us instead?)
but then it was
done.
the blazing hot sun
shone down on the ark- that giant monument to insane faith- drying the last
layer of tar sealant. door hinges greased. window panes set. cages secured,
feeding troughs in place. the "work" was done; everything else was
just cosmetic, so Mrs Noah was captain over that team. so much hard work, so many blisters and
sunburns, pulled muscles, strained finances.
turning that last calendar page must have felt surreal as the deadline
date circled in red approached.
the hardest part for a motivated, Type A, task do-er
is to stop. yes, Noah built the ark, but
then he had to put the hammer down.
either the boat was gonna float or it wasn’t. either God was gonna keep His promise or He
wasn't.
the first part of
Noah's response involved a lot of splinters and sweat.
that was the easy
part.
the second part-the
harder part- was simply to keep trusting the promise he'd gotten so long ago.
no splinters… probably still some sweating involved, though.
even though i have
fun, i sweat and stew all the time about all this work i do so far outside my
actual career path. i'll laugh, i'll sing, i'll distribute stale goldfish
liberally to any child that asks, but part of me is constantly freaking out- about things entirely outside my control and
realm of responsibility, no less. first
part of my response to God is to tell others by teaching: the easy part. second
part: letting God grow the seeds and reach these small minds and hearts, not so
much.
despite my
sit-still-and-just-trust issues, God sends moments like sparkling gems when i
need them. tonight was a gem; i hope i
keep this ruby around forever.
Avery, Olivia and
Charlotte wanted to read fairy tale books instead.
Sean was out of
sorts and adjusting to a new baby brother.
James is everyone's
friend and wanted to catch up on all the news.
Rebecca had a
boo-boo and wanted a doctor (not a "nurse," whatever that is) to look
at it immediately (the only doctor around was the gym teacher, and he's a
urologist).
Graham is the
self-appointed captain/ringleader/director and knew the Bible story anyway
(he's the PK, of course he does) and would rather confirm with me the details
on snack time or whisper in Isabel's ear.
nobody was overly
intent on listening- or at least looking like they were listening.
but right at the end
of story time when we were discussing other promises God has made, a wee little
voice piped up from a normally bouncy, rambunctious child and said, "i wonder why God had to punish Jesus."
amen and hallelujah.
well, child, let me
break it down for you!
God promised Adam, and Eve, and Noah and us
that He would punish sin, right? *little
heads nod yes*
Jesus never sinned,
did He? *little heads shake no*
raise your hand if
you're a sinner *all the little hands go up*
raise your hand if
you like being punished for breaking rules *aaaaaallll the little hands go back
down, except for Micah's who has already exceeded his attention span and wasn't listening*
God promised He would send someone to save us,
didn't He?
it's Jesus, kids.
it's Jesus.
Jesus told God that
He would take our punishment, so that we wouldn't have to.
if you ask them if
that's a "thumbs up" or "thumbs down" thing, you'll really
get them confused- because it's both good and
bad...but mostly good. kinda like Noah's
situation. judgement= bad, salvation= good.
Promise first, then
response. Jesus kept His promise, and
our response tonight was a prayer of heartfelt thankfulness, telling our
blue-vested children again that God promised to hear our prayers even though
their big trusting eyes couldn't physically see Him.
and the kid that you
always have the hardest time patiently corralling is the one who shows you at
just the right time that God also promised
to protect us and the kids, from floods and control-freak teachers alike.
i'll tell a Bible
story to the best of my ability, but then it's time for me to "put down
the hammer" like Noah and just let God do the rest of the teaching. the cleaning rampage can wait. i'm not done learning by any means. there's a pile of promises to sit down on,
and centuries' worth of rainbows overhead to remind us that "God Keeps His Promises." i hope i learn to listen and trust more like a Pre-K, and that you are able to take a breath and rest with me; there's more than enough room for us all here on this pile.
