I have a friend that calls me “Lucy” because I am a spontaneous person. Ok, so I get myself into trouble sometimes. I always have been and to some extent, I always will be 'spontaneous'. But with my spontaneity, come brilliant ideas! Because of it, I’ve gotten myself into some terrible predicaments throughout my life. Like the time when I was just a few years old and lit a match to the end of the toilet paper to see if I could unroll it faster than it could burn or when I ate a Daddy Long-Legged spider and sent my sister running through the house screaming for Mother. Or the time when I was five years old, my bird died and a week later I dug him up because I thought I heard its heart beating while I was swinging on my swing set. But I was the youngest, spoiled rotten and demanded things my way because I was used to getting what I wanted. That is, until I was on my own. Then I had to learn the hard way. . .

When I was 17, I had quite my job and found it difficult to find another one. Soon I was broke and almost out of gas. But I did have a brilliant idea! The next day before my job interview I decided to get up at the crack of dawn and siphon gas from someone else’s car! I woke up very early the next morning and got ready for my interview. I put on my make-up, fixed my hair, and wore my favorite dress with stockings and matching heels. Then I drove to a middle-class neighborhood and picked out my victim. The area I chose was perfect and I parked directly across the street. To the right of me, on the gas-cap side, was a vacant field. To the left of me was the car I chose sitting right in their driveway. I got out, walked across the street, snuck up to their house and rummaged around their yard until I found their garden hose. I cut the metal off of each end, stuck one end of the hose into their gas tank and quickly unraveled the rest of the hose down their driveway all the way across the street, around the back of my car to the passenger side, squatted down and put that end into my tank. Then I realized I had done it wrong. I was supposed to suck on it first. I pulled it out and started sucking away. No gas. I sucked harder. Still, no gas. I sucked harder and faster. A couple of times I lost my balance and fell on my rear in the dirt and rocks, getting my dress filthy and tearing my stockings. After a long time of doing that, I figured their end of the hose wasn’t down in their car far enough so I ran across the street, shoved the hose further down into their tank, ran back across the street, squatted down and proceeded to suck some more until it felt like my brain was going to fall out and still, no gas. I was filthy, sweaty and my hairspray had long-since worn off along with my patience. A half-hour had gone by since I started and it was getting light out so I stood up, threw the hose down, wiped the sweat off my face with my filthy hands, wiped the dirt from my dress and drove away defeated and disgusted. I wonder what these people thought when they walked out to their car that morning and saw one end of their garden hose stuck in their gas tank while the other end ran down their driveway all the way across the street. Maybe their words were, “Gee, that was a brilliant idea!”

There are times when we need to help our adult children and then there are times when we need to let them go to make their own mistakes as we put them in God’s Hands and keep them in prayer; Always listening to God’s prompting about what we should do in each situation. I’m not saying anything that I haven’t had to do myself. I have seen so many times when the most difficult children are the most faithful and obedient after God gets a hold of them. God’s many years of correction in my life has been harsh, but it fit the need and from it came His righteousness.

Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful; nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. (Hebrews 12:11)

Copyright Cheryl Taul
March 7, 2007

When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child;
but when I became a man, I put away childish things.
(1 Corinthians 13:11)

Midi "Farytale"