TTT - Sometimes Funny, Sometimes Serious

It's been a while since I've written a Tiny Talk Tuesday post, but this boy...

...hasn't stopped opening his mouth and blurting out things that I want to be able to read about when I'm 85 years old, drinking iced tea, and sitting in a rocking chair on my front porch.

Things like...

"When you pass gas when you're pooping, you don't have to say 'Excuse me'." He said this from the bathroom where he was...ahem...taking care of business; and as his little voice drifted out to the kitchen where I was, I thought, "Well, at least he's getting this etiquette thing figured out." :)

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A few weeks ago, my parents' car broke down, so we picked up my mom to take her to run a few errands, and my dad stayed with the car until the tow truck got there; we reconnected with him later. As we were making our way through Walmart, Mom was pushing a cart with David and Shav in it, and I had Josiah and Tobin with me. We happened to meet an old friend of mine, Maretta, and we stopped to chat for a few minutes. She remarked to David about how nice it was that Grandma was with him and was pushing his cart, and then he proceeded to explain to her the reason Grandma was with us: namely, that her car had broken down. All of us adults had basically tuned him out and were doing the "smile and nod" thing to him as we tried to continue our grown-up conversation, so as he went on with his explanation, Maretta absentmindedly said, "Oh, that's nice." He got our full attention quickly when he blurted out with a significant amount of indignation, "No, that is NOT nice!" We had to smooth his ruffled feathers and assure him that Maretta didn't think it was nice that the car had broken down, but that she did think it was nice that Grandma could be at Walmart with us. :)

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On another day, our friend Robin Zook was here to practice a piece of music with me. Josiah and David were having quiet time; but after Robin and I finished practicing, I told them they could come down and say hi to her. "Hi" turned into an extended conversation which covered quite a few topics; but at one point, David was sitting on her lap and asked her if she would marry him. (I guess he forgot that he's supposed to be engaged to Joelle!) Robin laughed and told him that she couldn't marry him because she already has a husband (not to mention the fact that she has children that are 4 and 5 times older than David). David's innocent reply: "You can have TWO husbands!" Oh, dear David, polyandry is really not an option. :)

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Besides the humorous stuff that David says, recently there have been plenty of serious conversations as well; and these are just as precious and note-worthy to me as the lighter quips. For example, David has talked a lot about good guys and bad guys, the good side and the bad side, etc. I couldn't help but think of Star Wars when he asked me one day, "Will you promise me that you'll never go to the bad side?" I smiled a bit as I earnestly promised him that I would never, ever do that.

Another conversation along these lines came about when he asked, "Are there bad people becoming good every day?" I answered him that yes, there are bad people making the decision to change and follow God every day; but I also added that people are being born every day, and they will have to decide when they grow up if they are going to follow God. Like Shav--he will have to make that decision someday to stay on the good side and be part of God's family. David was worried about Shav making the wrong choice, so I stopped what I was doing and we prayed for Shav to decide to follow God so he can go to heaven, too. We started talking about missionaries and how David can be God's messenger to the lost and help bad guys become good guys. David had one concern; he asked, "If I'm a missionary, can I still play-fight and have plastic swords?" :)

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And here's a conversation that touched my heart in a very deep way...

Out of the blue on our way to Josiah's violin lesson one Wednesday afternoon, David spoke up from the backseat of the minivan and asked, "Why doesn't God give us a shorter life? Because I want to go to heaven pretty soon!"

We talked about how some people DO have a short life, like Rein, the grandson of our interim pastor. We talked about how old he was when he died: four (just like David).

Then David said, "I wish I was him."

I told David about how God has a special job for him to do here on earth, like maybe there is a special lady for him to marry, special children for them to raise, and people that David needs to tell about Jesus so that they can go to heaven, too. David wanted to know if God had a special job for Josiah, too. I assured him that God has a special job--or purpose--for everyone, even Shav, little though he is; and when our special job is done, God lets us go to heaven.

It's interesting to me how much David thinks and talks about heaven; heaven is very real to him. It was also interesting to me that, while many people were mourning Rein's death, here was David, ENVYING him. May I have such simple, childlike, confident, eager-to-see-God-face-to-face faith!

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Check out Mary at Not Before 7 for more Tiny Talk Tuesday.