Quote of the day - But we can't see him

It snowed a ton last night. It was beautiful enough that after church, the girls violated their tradition of wailing in protest when our answer to, "Where are we going now?" is "Home."

(It's a happy home, really. Mostly. It's just that, not unlike their Mommy, they really like to go and do. And go and do some more.)

But "home" was an acceptable answer today, because there was half a foot of snow to come home to, the first since Christmas Day. It took an hour to track down the snow suits, get the mittens on, find Ashlyn's left boot, take them both off and put socks on, and get out in the fluffy white stuff.

We made a snow man, sat and dined on snow from the porch table, buried a doll inside the snow man to hide it from a bloodthirsty King Herod, and then buried the twins themselves. They stayed buried up to the neck until Ashlyn assured us that Herod was no longer a threat. "Jesus killed him," she said.

"No, Jesus did not kill Herod," I told her.

"Why?" asked Melía.

"That's not how Jesus rolls. He doesn't do the killing thing. He does the loving thing."

"Oh," said Melía.

Maybe it was connected or maybe it wasn't, but some time later, Ashlyn observed this:

"Jesus can see us, but we can't see him. That's magic."

"That's right, Ashie," I said.

"That's not magic," Brielle said. She is quite the demythologizer these days.

But magic or no, Ashlyn was on to something significant, I think. I find fault with myself or with God for my failure to see what I think my eyes of faith should. Maybe it's enough just to be seen.

When you tell my dad, "It's good to see you," he's going to tell you, "It's good to be seen." And he's right.

What if I settled down comfortably into the knowledge that whatever I see or don't see, God sees me? What if that paradox moved from my pile of annoyances to my temple of cherished mysteries?

What if it is magic?

Quote of the day - Not cool

I was just helping Melía dismount safely from her somersault over my knee. I wasn't sure exactly what she was up to, but our little gymnast is often wiggling around our laps and legs and shoulders, and I thought I'd help her land without breaking her neck this time. It seemed the prudent thing to do.

She squinched up her brow and let me know what she thought.

"Daddy, I was doing someping coo'. And then you did someping with me and it was not coo' anymore."

I'm sure this was the first of many such utterances from Melía, although she will probably learn to distill the sentiment into something more elegant. I could hear her saying, "I love you. And please butt out."

"Lame, Daddy," would work.

When words just don't do her feelings justice, the ever popular "Whatever!" finger symbol may serve.

My question for myself is this: How often do my prudent parental designs disrupt the genuine coolness of what my kid is up to? In the dance between childlike playfulness and fatherly purpose, how wont am I to step on the toes of the kids whom God sent to teach me as much as I them?

And turning it vertical, how often is God up to something really cool when I grab hold of things and help them land in a way that's more safe and sane--and lame? In a way that ensures my comfort--secure within the bell curve--but a way that calls for no faith, no risk, no grace?

Of faith and flying reindeers

Driving home in the minivan, still 6 weeks away from Halloween, Christmas was on my daughter's mind.

"Daddy, can Santa's reindeers really fly, for real life?"

I sensed this was the start of another high-stakes conversation, about far more than Rudolph and friends.

"That's a hard question, Brielle," I answered, wondering what skeptical kindergarteners had planted these seeds of doubt in my 5-year-old's mind. Maybe it was her 5th grade buddy? I went with an opinion poll--raw, objective data. "I know a lot of people say that Santa's reindeer fly. But other people don't believe that."

I know how to avoid taking a stand on an important issue as well as any good politician.

Quiet in the minivan.

"I've never seen Santa's reindeer fly, Brielle."

"But Daddy, you have never seen his reindeers at all."

"That's right. I haven't. So if I haven't seen them, I can't know if they can fly or not." I paused, trying to decide if this dialog should be connected at all to any larger questions. I was pretty sure it should not. But the old Bible teacher in me couldn't resist.

"Some people only believe what they can see. They don't believe anything is real except what they can see. Just like with God. Some people like you and me believe God is real even though we can't see Him. But other people don't believe in Him.

"I believe that lots of things that I can't see are real," I continued.

"Why, Daddy?"

"Well, Brie, my eyes are very small, and the world is so big--I think there must be a lot of things in such a big world that are real even if my little eyes can't see them."

"I only believe in God," Brielle said, all smiles.

"Yes, you do, my Brie. So do I."

A quarter mile of mountain road passed under our gray Odyssey as we neared home, my better sense scolding me for having a chat about faith in God at the same time we discussed the plausibility of airborne deer. But isn't it valid to compare two myths believed in and experienced joyfully by some and laughed at by others? Is faith not required for both? There would be time later to explain how the God stories we teach her are more intellectually defensible than those about St. Nick on the North Pole--not that I am ready to make that case just yet. I have years before she gets around to asking that.

On second thought, maybe I don't. Maybe I better get to the library and check out some C.S. Lewis, G.K. Chesterton, the best apologies I can find. Isn't there a kids edition of Lee Strobel's The Case for Faith?

While I questioned myself, Brielle was devising a plan of her own. "Daddy, this Christmas Eve, I'm going to go to bed in the front room on the couch. And I'm going to sleep a little bit and stay awake a little bit."

"Why, Brie?" I asked, feigning confusion. I knew where this was going.

"I'm going to find out if Santa's reindeers are real or if they are not. And then I'm going to tell all of you guys." She was very proud of this.

"That's good, my Brie," I said, appreciative of her scientific method, the show-me spirit inherited from her Missourian grandpa, but hoping she'd forget this plan by Christmas. Since she probably would not, I was also wondering what her odds of staying asleep in the front room the entire night before Christmas might be. For a second I think visions of Benadryl danced in my head.

"I'm going to find out if they really do fly or if they just walk a long ways," she announced. A beat. "My guess is that they ride from the North Pole on an airplane, and then go back to the North Pole on that airplane with Santa. And that's what I want to do."

"You want to go to the North Pole on an airplane?"

"Yes--but with my family," she said.

This was the most liberal exegesis of the Father Christmas narrative I had ever heard from her. For better or worse, the demythologizing of the sacred Santa scripture has already begun.

What will be next?

Jesus heal it

My daughters are extremely tuned in to the owies of the world. Rachelle's aunt is quite certain that Melía is destined to be an ER nurse, given her fixation on skin wounds. "Lou dot owie wight dere?" asks our little angel of mercy, pointing out even the most minor scratches and scars.

She is even more proud of her own ouchies. Owies guarantee sympathy and a reasonable chance of getting a princess band-aid applied, complete with medicine. But it also sets her up for a declaration of a miracle a couple days later. Peeling off the band-aid, she sticks the wounded finger in your face, beams and announces, "I ha' owie wight dere, but it all done, betause Jesus heal it!"

Never is a wound healed, but that Jesus gets credit from our daughters. When they announce this, I catch myself wondering, "Who taught them this?" I'm delighted to hear them say it, and suspect that indeed, Rachelle and I have taught this to them in our better moments.

But the purity of the attribution puts me to shame. I'm the guy who preached a sermon in college called, "If Miracles are Real, Where's Mine?" I've been looking for loopholes that explain God's relative inactivity in the miracle department all my life. And here are my daughters testifying to a wonder that I have long been overlooking.

Tonight at the coffee shop, my friend Dave and I were looking at a couple miracle stories in Matthew 8, and it was striking to see how people came for healing in full belief but without the sense of entitlement we that too often marks our most urgent prayers. They knew Jesus could do whatever he chose to do, but allowed him the freedom not to. They were expectant, but not presumptuous. They desperately wanted help, but unlike others who demanded a sign and were denied, the leper and the centurion did not need God to prove anything to them.

On my end, I play it much safer. Loathe to expect too much of God, I often expect too little. I exaggerate humble submission to God's will until it's a mere cowardice to ask, fearful that I'll ask for the wrong thing, be denied and go home with less faith than I began. To this self-censorship, I add blindness to the miracles that do happen every day. This leaves me searching the Scriptures for reasons to trust God not to do much of anything tangible in the world.

Not so for the Bennie girls. For them, the mere application of the band-aid is a prayer for a miracle that three days later, they know will be real.

Melía: "I ha' owie wight dere, but it all done, betause Jesus heal it!"

Mike: "Lord, I believe; help my unbelief."