Man Down!

On my way home from work each day, I usually stop to check our mail at the mail boxes near the front of our apartment complex, before driving the rest of the way back to our apartment. But yesterday, I broke the routine.


Our four year old grandson, Jacob, was at our place spending the afternoon with his Nana. So I figured that Jake and I could walk down to get the mail. That way Nana would have a chance to get supper going and take a well-deserved moment for herself. (Jake can really wear a person out fast, and she had been with him over three hours by the time I got there to give her some relief!)


As I got to the apartment, Nan greeted me at the door. I didn't see Jake, though, so I asked Nan where he was. Nan playfully said, "I don't know! I can't find him! He was here, and now I don't know where he is! Can you help me find him?" Of course, these were all cues to let me know that Jake was hiding from me and it would be my job over the next several minutes to search our home from top to bottom before eventually finding him in one of his favorite hiding places, under the end table by the sofa. So that's what I did and before too long we were out the door and on our way to the mail boxes.


Now, you have to understand that Jake seldom walks anywhere. He almost always runs and this afternoon was no different. I, on the other hand, seldom run anywhere! Fortunately, my walk is only slightly slower than his run. I would let Jake run a little ahead, and then stomp my feet hard against the sidewalk, as if I was running hard to catch up to him. He would squeal and laugh and glance back to see how close I was to catching him. Then once I had caught him, the whole scenario would replay itself.


Jake is at an age where he is not a particularly good listener. It reminds me of something they used to teasingly say about my grandfather, "He's not hard of hearing. He's just hard of listening!" But with Jake, it sometimes concerns me, because he doesn't have a lot of experience with understanding first-hand what can happen when you don't listen.


I can tell him all day long to stay on the sidewalk, and not to go out into the street. And I can explain the dangers of being hit by a car, but he only sees the reasons why, in his mind, he needed to do it. "There was a kitten that needed me! I wanted to walk on the other sidewalk!" I try not to let him get too far ahead of me because of this very thing.


So, as we were "walking" down to the mailbox, Jake decided that he would duck between to parked cars to hide from me. But as he stepped off of the sidewalk he stumbled and took a small spill onto one knee on the pavement. It was nothing terribly serious, just a slight scrape. After inspecting the knee, a very few seconds of "fake crying," and another lecture from me on the dangers of going out into the road, he was back to running down the sidewalk, only to stumble and fall once again.


No scrapes this time, but he did grab his ankle and with a second even shorter "fake cry" he explained, "I hurt my . . . this thing!" I started to ask if he was going to be okay, but by that time he was already up and running again.


On up ahead Jake stopped to once again check his knee injury and after looking closely discovered, BLOOD! "I'm bleeding! I'm bleeding!" he exclaimed, followed by more "fake crying." By the time I reached him he had plopped himself down on the sidewalk. I looked carefully at his knee and was actually able to see a little blood coming up in the scrape. I assured him that I thought he would live to which he over-dramatically responded, "You . . . go on without me . . . just . . go on without me!"


Being the compassionate grandpa that I am, I laughed and said something like, "Come on, drama boy!" And with that he was up and running again. There was not another mention of it until we arrived back at the apartment, where for Nana's sake it became a two-bandaid crisis!





Of course, Jacob knew I would have never left him behind. And so it is with our Heavenly Father. We can be assured that he will never leave us no matter what or who we face.




"Be strong and of good courage, do not fear nor be afraid of them; for the LORD your God, He is the One who goes with you. He will not leave you nor forsake you."
--Deuteronomy 31:6 (NKJ)

WILDFIRE! --well, not exactly.

Today, it is colder where I live in Florida, than it is where my parents live in Colorado. That is not usually the case, by any means! But my wife and I really do enjoy the few days that we get here when the temperature dips a little towards what most of the rest of the nation routinely experiences every winter. And so while many people here are complaining about the cold, Nan and I don't mind at all that it dropped down around the freezing mark last night.

After all, it does give us the opportunity to use one of the "perks" our apartment affords us--our fireplace. Our apartment is on the third floor of one of the buildings in our complex. And as a reward for climbing all those stairs to get here, we enjoy the added features of a vaulted ceiling and a fireplace in our living room. Naturally, we get a little excited when it looks like we might actually be able to have a fire in the fireplace, without turning on the air conditioner to compensate for it!

This was the case last night. When Nan and I got home late from a meeting at our church, our apartment was pretty chilly, no doubt a result of having left the window open to let some cool weather in! So Nan suggested that I could build a fire in the fireplace with the firewood she had gotten a few days earlier in anticipation of the coming colder weather. That way we could enjoy a little quiet time together in front of a cozy fire, before bed.

And so that is what I set about to do. I am not going to detail all that I did to try to get the fire started, but let's just say that after over an hour of trying, I decided to pack it in for the night. I had about decided that the wood that Nan had gotten, must have been treated with fire repellent or something. And further, I couldn't imagine how it is that wildfires are such a problem when I couldn't even intentionally start a fire in my own fireplace! So I woke Nan up--she had fallen asleep waiting on the couch--and we headed to bed.

This morning I awoke with renewed determination and once again set about the task of building a fire. This time with great success (see photo below, as documented evidence).

Once again I was secure in my masculinity. I had made fire and was confident that if Nan and I were ever stranded on a remote island somewhere that I could do it again--if I had a big enough box of matches!

And what did I learn? I found out that it isn't always easy to keep something burning. You have to keep feeding it. And the more you feed it, the hotter it gets and the more it spreads. And so it is with us on so many levels.

What's burning on the inside of you? And what are you doing to keep that fire--that passion--alive? As you go forward into the new year, remember if you want it to live, you have got to feed it!

Have a blessed 2009!