Checkers and Forgiveness

Last night before bed, Will and I played 2 games of checkers and it was a ton of fun. Well, sure enough, when Drew (his little brother) saw us, he said he wanted to play too. So right before bed, Drew and I wrote a note to remind us to play Checkers in the morning. Well that didn’t sit too well with the 6 year old.

So this morning about 6:57 am, I hear Will get up and come in our room. He lays there for a minute and then asks if he can go do something. I say “sure buddy” and he runs out. He comes back in a minute and looks like he has seen a ghost. Then Drew’s door opens. So I ask Will if he did something to wake up his brother and he is just standing there all pale and looking guilty. So I look at Sarah and almost laughing ask again, “Will, what did you just go and do?” and he says something like, “Nothing, why do you want to know?” to which I am like laughing inside, going, “Come on buddy what are you trying to hide?” “What did you do?”

After about a minute, he finally confesses that he took the note that Drew and I had written to remind us to play checkers the next morning. And I mean you would have thought that he had eaten the forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden or something. He was “guilty as charged.” I was so proud of him for actually being honest and confessing it which was cool. So I knew I needed to seize the teachable moment.

at 7:00 am… (there’s nothing like parenting!)

So I say, “What’s going on in your heart buddy?” And he starts to say that he doesn’t want Drew to play with his checkers game. So we talked about having an Abundance Mentality and that he wouldn’t like it if he went to a friend’s house and they wouldn’t let him play with their playstation or something. He agreed. So I asked him about what he needed to do to clean up his heart and he said, ‘Get the weeds out.” (Which was really cute by the way…)

So I said, “How do we do that?” and he said, “Ask forgiveness.” “From whom?” He replied, ‘From God’ “and…” “from you and Drew.” So right there at 7:05 am in the morning, he asks Drew to forgive him and then me and then he prays the cutest prayer I’ve probably ever heard: “Jesus, I’m sorry I hid the note, please forgive me and cleanse my heart of the weeds.”

Then he had to go get the game and set it up for Drew and I to play. That was hard. Making restitution. He didn’t want to do it, but he did it and I was so proud of him. He sat there the whole time watching his brother and I play checkers and not getting to play… But his heart was clean and you could tell he felt great.

On our way to school I revisited the whole incident and let him know how proud I was of him for all that he had done that morning. I told him how we as people are going to make mistakes and hurt people and sin. Then I told him that if he could learn this lesson of keeping a real short leash on his heart and not letting sin go too long without asking for forgiveness and making it right with those we wrong, that it would be the greatest lesson of his life.

I think his comment was, “Dad, look at that bird flying up there!!!” I think he got it! At least I hope so. I know that at 32 years old, I’m still trying to get it. I’m glad he’s starting early.

Just a bloggish thought…

Matt