I love kids, obviously I must because I went to school to teach the little munchkins. Everyone tells me that it takes a special kind of person to want to teach kids especially the little ones I love to work with. I personally love it and it comes like second nature to me. The Bible tells us that we need to be like children in our faith with God, and I’ve gained a few lessons on this in the last few months.
If you have read my bio page then you know that I’ve taught preschool for the last three years. I love this age, because they are so caring and excited about life and learning. Every spring when the dandelions start to pop up I tell the kids that if they promise not to pick any while we are walking to the playground that when the field is full of them I will let them go out and pick as many as they want for 5 minutes. I do this becuase otherwise I am constantly trying to keep them in line becuase every little dandelion that pops up they want to pick. This ussually works rather well and when that day comes when there are just tons of the little yellow weeds all over and I tell them we are going to go pick them they LOVE it. They eagerly run around that field and pick every bit that they can wrap their small hands around. When we go back in they have huge handfuls of dandelions to take home. I am sure not all parents are excited about that backpack full of these things, but the kids love is so much I can’t help but let them do it. Besides, it’s only once a year. With kids it’s the simple things that make them so happy. That is lesson number one. Life doesn’t have to be full of huge exciting big things, because it’s the little stuff that means the most. Hanging out with friends, having a fun meal with your family, reading a good book, enjoying the beauty that God has created all around us, you get the idea.
Out of these huge handfuls of dandelions the kids ussually give a few to me. Now to you and I these little yellow things are weeds that grow all over our yards and have to be mowed over. To these kids though these flowers are a way that they show love. They give me a few flowers because they care about me. I could look at these things and throw them away becuase after all they are just weeds, but I remind myself of a Five Iron Frenzy song where it says “He sees love where anyone else would see weeds.” The song talks about how a mother sees love in teh handful of dandelions her son picks for her, just like God sees the things we offer Him as love, even though compared to how awesome He is they are so small. It is all about the heart though and He knows just like a mom knows that these are a big sign of love, even if they seem small. That is lesson two.
Lesson three comes from my last week spent directing 2nd and 3rd grade church camp. I have been involved with this camp either as a dorm counselor, lead counselor, or camp director for 8 years now. I’ve seen many camps and for this age group we’ve always had worship with CDs and very kid kinda songs. You know what I’m talking about, groups of kids singign praise and worhsip stuff, sometimes the leader has done VBS music from their church. This works great and the kids enjoy it so why change it right? This year however the person I ussually ask to lead worship was unable to do so. I instead relied on the full time staff to take care of worship. I went and bought some kids worship CDs they could use and then when I got there and talked to them they told me that if it was okay with me they kinda had a band formed already for worship. I thought, well okay it’s yoru thing, but I wonder how well this wll work with this age group. I should have known God can work through whatever. The guy who was leading was so good at picking out songs that were kid friendly and if they were hard to understand he explained them in ways the kids could understand. The staff was also amazing because they didn’t make the kids just stand there and sing. They let them worhsip God like 7-9 year olds. They were dancing around with the kids and waving their arms and just letting the kids worship God in their own ways. It was beautiful to watch. So lesson number three, worhsip like an 9 year old, without any cares of what others think, just let God know how much you love Him.
So, that is what I’ve learned from kids. I have afealing that there is much more we can learn from them. I think no matter what age we are we can all learn from each other and these guys sure have showed me that. :o)
