Joyous All the Time
Luke 2:41-52
Illustration
by King Duncan

We can learn from our children sometimes. The wife of an Adventist minister was writing about their family life. She said that their family lives in apartments most of the year, because they move from city to city holding evangelistic meetings.

One evening, after a meeting, she and her daughter took all of the dirty clothes out of their temporary apartment home to a Laundromat. They closed the door on a naked apartment: the beds were stripped, the towels were taken down, their clothes supply was exhausted. Everything went in the triple-load washer at the Perky Clean Laundromat. This wife and mother didn't feel very perky at 11:00 p.m., but she knew the job had to be done. Suddenly the washing machine stopped. The attendant called the manager. When he arrived, he said she'd have to come back in the morning. They were sending her home with no sheets to sleep on, no towels to dry on, and no clean clothes to put on! She confesses that she was steamed. Until Beth, her daughter, exclaimed, "Oh, Mom, being a minister's family is so exciting! Isn't this fun!" As her daughter giggled with spontaneous glee, she saw she really meant it. And this exhausted mother began to laugh with her. There wasn't anything else to do. Except, of course, to thank God for her wonderful daughter, who used her influence to bless her Mom at nearly midnight in the Perky Clean Laundromat.

There are some lessons we can learn from our children. That's why on one occasion, when Jesus wanted to make a point to his disciples, he put a little child in the midst of them. Children learn from their parents, but there are lessons parents can learn from their children.

ChristianGlobe Networks, Inc., ChristianGlobe Illustrations, by King Duncan