A Joyful Mum
A Joyful Mum
My eleven year old son was outside hitting a tennis ball against the side of the house the other day when I heard a dull thud instead of the usual firm one. A few moments later, he came through the door and put his racquet away - and I felt really blessed.
A few months earlier my husband, Chris, had told our son that he was allowed to hit a tennis ball against the house, but if the ball hit a window, he had to immediately stop and come inside.
Over the following months, I didn’t take particular notice of how often he played, or whether the ball hit the wall or the window.
I did notice that his skill was increasing, and every so often he would tell me of a new record he had just achieved for the number of times he hit the ball in a row without a break - 504 at last count.
For some reason, the other day was different. I was attentive to the noise of the ball hitting the wall (well, the truth is, I was counting, and willing my son to break his record!) so noticed the dull thud of the ball hitting the window screen.
However, I had forgotten that Chris had told our son to come inside if this happened, so it wasn’t until the door opened and our son stepped inside that I connected his sudden appearance with the dull thud.
I didn’t say anything to him at the time, but mentioned to Chris how blessed I was to see our son following his father’s directive without any policing from us.
“Yes!” Chris sounded surprised but pleased. “I only realised two weeks ago that he was still doing that. It’s great to see.”
Clearly, Chris too was blessed by our son’s commitment to obey his father.
I thought of the scripture from Proverbs 23:25. It speaks of the response of a parent who has a wise child and says, “Your father and your mother shall be glad and she who bore you shall rejoice.”
This verse came to life for me, as well as my husband, as our hearts rejoiced in the wisdom our son demonstrated by his willing obedience to an instruction given months earlier by his father.