Twin Musings

I love watching my children's relationship with God blossom and unfold. One of my greatest delights as a mother is to witness their internal response as they sense the movement of the Holy Spirit in their lives. In the past couple of weeks I have been able to observe or participate in a couple of such interactions.

During the church service on Mother's Day my six-year old son was sitting on his father's lap listening to the reading from the epistle appointed for the day. It happened to be the passage out of Revelation 21:10, 22- 22:5

"And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me the holy city, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God,...And the city has no need of the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God has illumined it, and its lamp is the lamb..."

As the lector was reading this passage I happened to glance over at my son. I noticed that he was staring intently at the stained glass window located above the southern entrance of our church (pictured above). I watched as he began tapping his dad excitedly on the arm, but, my husband, who was listening to the reading, ignored him. J. looked up again at the window, then back to his father. Finally, I saw him take his hand and gently put it on his father's cheek in order to move his face into a position in which he, too, could view the stained glass. It was as though he was saying, "Dad, you don't just have to listen to him read about it, you can actually SEE it. LOOK, isn't it beautiful!?"

He was excited that he had made a connection between the window he was seeing and the Scripture he was hearing read aloud in church. I was excited because I could see in him an attunement to spiritual things and an internal "yes" response to the Lord Jesus. May it ever be so!

The second event occurred just two days ago. My six year-old daughter brought me a picture she had made for her older sister. She wanted to tell me about the picture she had drawn of Jesus' crucifixion. Apparently Holy Week made quite an impression on her this year!

She proceeded to tell me, as a good classical education student should, a narrative about the picture I was seeing.

It went something like this:

B: "This is Jesus on the cross. He is very sad. He is saying the words to that song that daddy sang after Fr. Dan washed your feet and all the lights went out. You know, the one about God leaving him."

Me: "You mean "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" from Psalm 22 that the choir sang on Maundy Thursday?"

B: "Yes, that one. See how his mouth is open and he is saying that?"

Me: "Yes, I do. You did a nice job. Who are the two people there by the cross?"

B: "Mary and John, of course." (Becca likes to use the words, "of course" a lot!)

Me: "What are they doing?"

B: "Mom! (indignantly) They are crying. Wouldn't you be crying if your only son or your best friend was dying on a cross for all the sins of the world?"

She gets it! Praise God!

Enough said.