Another good day here in El Paso has come to an end. We took lots of pictures today, but I'm not going to post any of them because of how long it takes to do that process here on the base. I'm simply too tired to try it tonight. So I'll have to settle for telling you the story of our day.
We worshiped this morning over at Sunshine Community Church. Diana was helping a neighbor care for her twin babies, so she stayed back while the rest of us went to church. As it turned out, the children's church needed a little help this morning, and since I'm used to doing that on Sunday mornings ... I helped! It worked out well, though, because Matthew, Chris and Emma really wanted me to come to their class with them. We colored quite a few pictures while the teacher read to us from her Bible story book about Adam and Eve and about what it means to obey or disobey God. The teacher passed out nice red apples for the children to eat, and they also cut out and decorated an apple to take home with them. It was fun for me to be in a classroom setting with my grandchildren and be a helper at the same time.
When we got home from church, the twin babies were at Jesse and Di's house ... guess who was happy about that? Grandpa Jones! We ate lunch together and then the children and I worked on making 15 greeting cards for some very special people in our family! We used pretty stamps and colorful stamp pads and designed cards together.
After our cards were finished, we did some stencil pictures and tracings, and our friend Sierra came over and made pictures with us too.
Later in the afternoon, Jesse and Diana returned the twins next door and went out on a dinner date. Grandpa Jones and I ate dinner with the little kids and then we got out my basket of playdough and all of the good toys that go along with that. We had a good time making snakes and cutting out shapes and just talking and visiting about our day.
When it was story time, I picked one of my favorites from The Jesus Storybook Bible about Jesus calming the storm. We read it together and talked and talked about how great it is that Jesus cares about us when we are afraid and how powerful He is to help us through any trouble we find ourselves in. We also read some repeat chapters of Emma's Magic Winter, the book I bought Emma for her birthday. The kids just about have it memorized by now and it's so cute how they remember every single detail of it and enjoy it just as much every time we read it.
I love talking with Matthew, Chris and Emma. I love hearing the things the think about. I love their honesty and even their bluntness. We had an interesting conversation at the playground yesterday. We had found a little dead bird laying in the gravel nearby and we dug a hole and buried it. We were wondering what had happened that had caused this little bird to die. So Christopher started telling a "story" about it how he saw a BIG HUGE EAGLE come swooping out of the sky and chase this little bird ... and then the bird hit his head on the playground equipment and died.
As Christopher is telling the story, Emma's face is getting all agitated and she interrupts him by saying, "Grandma, that's not true. Christopher is telling a lie." Well, I'm not so sure Christopher was actually telling a "lie" so much as he was enjoying making up a good story. But I decided talking about lying was probably a good idea and certainly couldn't hurt. So Chris and I went back and forth about only saying what was TRUE and that stories are fun to tell, but it's important to always tell the truth, etc.
So Christopher confessed to me that he tells lies quite a bit. He made a real sad face about it and said that he was sorry. So I told him that God forgives us when we are sorry and we could talk to Him about it. Christopher immediately stood to his feet, climbed to the top of the playground equipment, looked up to the sky and said, "God! I'm sorry for my lies!" Just like that. And then he asked God to help him not tell any more.
Like I said, I'm not so sure Christopher was lying about the bird story as much as he was enjoying himself hugely in making up an interesting story. But it was so sweet to see him look up into the sky and shout out his confession to God.
Meanwhile, Matthew said in his small voice, "Maybe God is away and can't hear Christopher." So I reminded Matthew that God is always close by and never far away. Matthew then said, "Well maybe God is sleeping right now and we shouldn't bother Him." I suppose you can imagine my response. I hugged little Matthew and told him that God never ever sleeps and He is never bothered when we talk to Him. Matthew's smile afterward was so precious. Anyway, we've had tons of these kinds of conversations the last few days. All of them are precious to me.
"He will not let you stumble and fall; the One who watches over you will not sleep ... the LORD Himself watches over you! The LORD stands beside you as your protective shade. The sun will not hurt you by day, nor the moon at night. The LORD keeps you from all evil and preserves your life ..." From Psalm 121
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1 comment:
Carol, we enjoyed the narrative very much and appreciate the time you took to write it down and the time you spend with the kids teaching them about right and wrong and Our Father. Thank you, because that's the kind of time they need with their grandparents.
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