Today Adriana and I celebrate 17 years of marriage! I’m so grateful to have such an incredible lover of God as my best friend, mother of our children, and partner in life and ministry.
How Jars of Beads Have Affected My Parenting
Man, they grow up so fast! It’s true what they say: Don’t blink; they’ll be grown up before you know it. This past week we’ve been watching old home movies of our girls when they were little. Now they are almost 16 and 12 years old, and time is tickin’!
A number of months ago I was having a conversation with my friend Gregg and he told me about a practice he has that really caught my attention. He has three daughters, and for each one of his daughters he has a jar with marbles in it. Each marble represents a day that his daughters have until they leave his house bound for college or career. Every day he removes one marble. A few possibilities came to my mind in terms of reasons Gregg does this:
- Gregg doesn’t like his girls and can’t wait for them to be out of the house.
- Gregg loves his wife and misses the good ole days before they had children. He’s just counting down the days until they are empty nesters and able to simply enjoy one another’s company in a quiet home.
- Gregg loves his daughters very much and wants to have a visual reminder that his time with them during this season of life is limited, and he wants to have something constantly kicking him in the pants to spend time with his girls.
I know Gregg. I know he really likes his daughters … a lot! I was instantly able to eliminate option 1.
I know Gregg. I know how much he loves his wife. I am sure that they will very much enjoy the next season of life as empty nesters and the ability to spend more focused time together. But I know that his jar with marbles wasn’t some countdown until his girls are out of the house. Option 2 was out.
I know Gregg. I know that capitalizing on every opportunity to spend time cherishing his daughters by spending time with them is really important to him. I know was his motivation for the jar filled with marbles. Option 3 was the answer.
For a few weeks I couldn’t stop thinking about the jars and the marbles. I thought about my own daughters. I am as guilty as the next person of choosing selfish activities over engaging with my girls. One evening I decided I needed something that would kick me in the pants and remind me to get up and spend time with my girls. So, I made the trip to the store. I bought two jars. I bought a few thousand beads (I had to be a little different than Gregg!). Then I came home and did the math. I put the number of beads in each respective jar that represent the days left until our daughters are off to college or the next phase of their lives after high school. Every day I remove one bead from each jar. Not in some morbid or selfish countdown. No. Every time I look at those jars I ask myself:
Did I engage my daughters today?
Did I invest in them?
Did I maximize the time I had to spend with them?
Some days, sadly, the answer is no.
Some days, gladly, the answer is yes.
Above all, every day I have an in-my-face visual reminder to get off my can and spend time with the most important people God has put in my life.
Today, using mid-August as a projected departure time for college, Claudia is down to just 1,100 days until she’s off to the next season of her life and the dynamics of our relationship change. Natalia is at 2,196. Time is tickin’! We’ll never get these days or this season back. Carpe diem. Seize the day.
A Prayer:
God, help us to connect and build memories with our children.
Let them look back on their years knowing that we cared.
Let them long tell stories of the shared experiences we had during their growing-up years.
You are Emmanuel, God with us.
Help us to reflect this reality of who You are to them in our actions.
Let them remember that through good and bad, ups and downs, days filled with sun shine and days that are overcast and rainy, that we were there – present, with them.
Amen.
Daughter Named Yankee Captain!
Today was day 1 of Yankees camp for Natalia, and she was named one of the team captains by her coach! She’s playing with a baseball rather than a softball this week, so there’s some adjustment, but she’s doing awesome! So proud of her!
Natalia Off to Camp!
This morning I dropped Natalia off for her first day at Yankees camp! She’s really excited and I am jealous. 🙂
Back to NYC to Meet Up With Virginia Friends
Today after church we took our buddy Saul and hopped on the train and headed into the city again — this time to have lunch in Little Italy with our former neighbors and friends from Virginia, Austin and Sarah. I did their wedding 6 years ago, and it was so much fun reconnecting with them. We then walked down to Chinatown and did a little shopping before saying farewell to Austin and Sarah. We then walked down to Ground Zero/Freedom Tower, then down to and along the river up to the Staten Island Ferry. We enjoyed riding the ferry to SI and back before heading back up to Penn Station and home. It was a beautiful and very nice, fun day.
Family Night in NYC and Saw 2 More College Friends
Today was a beautiful day, so we decided to head into Manhattan. Just before we left this afternoon, I saw a picture on Facebook revealing that my friend James Dodzweit was in the city. A few texts, and we were able to meet up with him for about an hour. He was in town with a group from his church on a missions trip. As we talked he informed me that another friend of ours had a new restaurant just a few blocks away on Bowery. After we parted, our family had a delicious dinner in Little Italy then we walked up Bowery and stopped in to say hello to Patrick Cappiello and check out his new restaurant Pearl and Ash. It was neat reconnecting with both of these guys!
In all of my years in New York City, one thing I have never done, believe it or not, is take a cab. Well, tonight, our family took a cab from downtown up to Bryant Park where we enjoyed a beautiful evening in the park. We walked around Times Square for a while them down to Penn Station and came home. Fun day with the family!
Others May: You Cannot
I received this via a friend who attended the same Bible College we did. He said they used to receive this upon graduation. I have been meditating on it for some time now. Selah.
“Others May: You Cannot”
by G. D. Watson (1845-1924).
If God has called you to be really like Jesus He will draw you into a life of crucifixion and humility, and put upon you such demands of obedience, that you will not be able to follow other people, or measure yourself by other Christians, and in many ways He will seem to let other people do things which He will not let you do.
Other Christians and ministers who seem very religious and useful, may push themselves, pull wires, and work schemes to carry out their plans, but you cannot do it, and if you attempt it, you will meet with such failure and rebuke from the Lord as to make you sorely penitent.
Others may boast of themselves, of their work, of their successes, of their writings, but the Holy Spirit will not allow you to do any such thing, and if you begin it, He will lead you into some deep mortification that will make you despise yourself and all your good works.
Others may be allowed to succeed in making money, or may have a legacy left to them, but it is likely God will keep you poor, because He wants you to have something far better than gold, namely, a helpless dependence upon Him, that He may have the privilege of supplying your needs day by day out of an unseen treasury.
The Lord may let others be honored and put forward, and keep you hidden in obscurity, because He wants to produce some choice fragrant fruit for His coming glory, which can only be produced in the shade. He may let others be great, but keep you small. He may let others do a work for Him and get the credit for it, but He will make you work and toil on without knowing how much you are doing; and then to make your work still more precious He may let others get credit for the work which you have done, and thus make YOUR REWARD TEN TIMES GREATER WHEN JESUS COMES.
The Holy Spirit will put a strict watch over you, with a jealous love, and will rebuke you for little words and feelings or for wasting your time, which other Christians never feel distressed over. So make up your mind that God is an Infinitely Sovereign Being, and has a right to do as He pleases with His own. He may not explain to you a thousand things which puzzle your reason in His dealings with you, but if you absolutely sell yourself to be His love slave, He will wrap you up in Jealous Love, and bestow upon you many blessings which come only to those who are in the inner circle.
Settle it forever, then that you are to DEAL DIRECTLY WITH THE HOLY SPIRIT, and that He is to have the privilege of tying your tongue, or chaining your hand, or closing your eyes, in ways that He does not seem to use with others. Now, when you are so possessed with the living God that you are, in your secret heart, pleased and delighted over this PECULIAR, PERSONAL, PRIVATE, JEALOUS GUARDIANSHIP AND MANAGEMENT OF THE HOLY SPIRIT OVER YOUR LIFE, then you will have found the vestibule of Heaven.
-from Faith, Prayer, and Tract League: Tract #76; Grand Rapids, MI 49504
The Creation Museum
Last Wednesday while on vacation we drove into Kentucky and visited The Creation Museum. The museum holds a young earth position, but whether one holds to a young earth or an old earth position, the main point is that God is the Creator. The museum takes you through what it calls “The 7 C’s of History” to highlight God’s plan: Creation, Corruption, Catastrophe, Confusion, Christ, Cross, and Consummation. It was really neat walking through the story of God in history and seeing the displays of such things as the Garden of Eden, Noah’s Ark, etc. The the museum itself, as a museum, was very well done. It’s definitely worth a trip if you’re in the area. Oh yeah, and a walk through the gardens, a visit to the petting zoo, and of course, a ride on the camel makes the day complete.
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