It was then that it hit me like a ton of bricks. I have raised three children. I have years of car seats buckled in the back seat of our vehicles. Two girls and one boy, that meant one thing to me that day. I have had a lot of giggling and laughing going on in my back seat, but try as I might I couldn’t recall any of them. I started desperately running down memory lane trying to think about events and the years attached to when my children were little. It was then the slap came. Whoa, I missed all that?
I stood with my arm around a young man in our church this weekend and listen to him worry about the expense attached to raising children. He is about to be a dad for the first time. (Congratulations Trea and Holly) I told him if you wait until you can afford children you will never have children. Yes, I know one needs to prepare financially and plan well in this area. But Children are expensive, but they are worth every cent. But I am afraid that we tend to focus on the chore so much that we miss too many sweet moments. I know I did. Now I set here struggling to remember things I know happened but “Whoa I missed all that!”
I have spent many evening at dinner lately enjoying conversations with my oldest daughter Rachel. Each event if filled with meaningful and memory making talk. Looking back from here at her life I can recall a few moments here and there of her growing up. They make me smile. But there are a lot of weeks, months and years between the recalled events. I know she laughed and giggled through her childhood like any little girl but “Whoa I missed all that somehow”. Really, it’s easy to understand. Rachel and I were talking the other day about a vacation our family took through eight states pulling our camper. She began to tell me what she remembered most and etched in her memory was me being upset and tense because of some truck trouble. Looking back it wasn’t a big deal. We had to replace a tire on the camper that about blew out and the starter on the truck that died in South Dakota. Both were very fixable. So why didn’t I recall the laughs and giggles? I was too frustrated because something in life went a little wrong. Yes, the expense touched our vacation but why were we there any way? To blow money or to spend time together. So in all my fretting (Stop acting like you don’t do this) I missed a bunch of moments I will never get back. All I can say is “Whoa I missed all of that.”
My son came home a few weeks back on a weekend break from his internship out of state. I was able to spend a half a day just he and I doing ministry and talking. It was memory making and a wonderful blessing. I looked back from that day to try to remember some other times in my life being in his day. The first one that came to mind caused me to have to go back eighteen years. He was a little tot and we went to spend the morning in the woods. There he filled his little pockets with acre-nuts as he called them (acorns). He came home thrilled with all his finds. That was wonderful. But I am sure between then and today there were many laughs and special moments. I can recall a few here and there but again there are months, no years between the events. “Whoa I missed all that?”
What do I remember about all those years with little kids in my back seat? Things like, working hard many hours trying to be the providing Dad. Many times I only saw his children asleep because I left before they woke up and came home after they were in bed. Stressing over how to pay a bill or make enough money so we could have a better house like my friends. Working in ministry and driving all over the northern part of the state to be a good leader. Stressing over how I wasn’t getting the breaks as we called them and wondering why I wasn’t pastoring a larger church. Yes, I was consumed with things and making sure I came off as the perfect preacher. Looking back today I can remember much about those things. It took an emotional crash and later heart disease to get my focus. Today I realize I missed a lot of the really precious moments because they simply seemed too juvenile and immature of me for the moment. But they were not; they were powerful loving moments that could have lasted a life time if I would have stopped long enough to hear them.
Yes, I believe we should try hard. Reach as high as we can and accomplish great things in God. I believe one should work hard and use their God given talents to produce. There is nothing wrong with having better things as long as the Kingdom of God is first in our lives. But I feel our lives would be so much better if we could learn to stop missing the important stuff. Giggles, laughing and smiles are God produced. They come from the created being He has blessed our lives with. All too often while we are caught up in a moment of being important or working hard and being what we call spiritual we miss some glorious times God designed for us. Moments right there in our children, our grandchildren or a child that Jesus has allowed to walk through our life. We miss the giggles coming from the back seat.
As I have watched our children’s team here at FPB this week end put on our annual Kid’s Crusade and watch children respond to Jesus, it is easy to understand Mark 18:17. We adults desperately need to hear the chatter and voices of children in our lives. They help us understand how to approach God. Listen, and listen close, there might be a giggle coming from your back seat as you rush to accomplish that important life you are trying to create. Listen closes there just might be a belly laugh and child chatter in your life that God put there to brighten your day or point you in the right direction. Don’t get so caught up with grabbing all the stuff and becoming important that you miss some of the most wonderful sounds from heaven. If you don’t stop and listen you will end up where I am and saying, “Whoa I missed all of that?”
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