Lessons in Sharing

While I try to make Elijah and Noah sound like high-maintenance young men (which they are!), there are some very simple things in life that bring considerable joy.

One of those things is going to the mailbox.

Elijah and Noah love to run down to the curb, open our dilapidated black mailbox, and peer inside. They'll thin divide up the loot between them and scamper back up to the house to let Mommy and/or Daddy distribute the mail accordingly. This past week's mail delivery brought little tears to my eyes on two separate occasions...as my boys (once again) taught their father some valuable lessons.

On Monday Elijah got his first magazine. My father-in-law is the world's greatest handyman, and subscribes to a multitude of such periodicals. One of the magazines he subscribes to gave him a free subscription to give to a friend. Knowing how much Elijah likes mail, he signed Elijah up for 12 months of "Handyman Monthly."

When the first issue arrived on Monday, Elijah was ecstatic. He quickly sat down and started looking through all of the pages. He came to a picture of a large, lavish bathtub...the kind his mother has been hounding me for since we were first married. Elijah, knowing how much his mother loves to take baths, told her, "Mommy, I'm going to build this for you." Robin informed him that those cost a lot of money. So Elijah went to his room, got his piggy bank and Spider Man wallet, emptied on the floor in front of Robin and said, "Here, you can use my money to help buy it." (For the record, Elijah is also going to build me a tractor!)

On Saturday, the boys once again went through their routine. This time, Noah returned to the door with a birthday card from "Grandma Mart" (his great-grandmother). Inside the card was $30! When Noah opened the card the money fell to the floor. Noah quickly bent down and picked up the cash - holding a $20 in one hand and a $10 in the other. Then he looked at the money, looked at his brother, handed Elijah the $20 and said, "Here Elijah, I share wid you."

Maybe I'm wrong...but I think this is the sort of thing Jesus had in mind when He said, "Unless you change and become like little children you will never enter the Kingdom of Heaven."