WPTM #12: Distractions

What Parenting Teaches Me #12: Distractions

When we took Noah to Monkey Joe's the other day, after about 30 minutes it happened again. He got distracted from the main event - that being all the giant, blown up, jumpy, climby, slidey things. He got distracted by the silly, cheap, and stupid flashy light quarter slot games and other such rip offs. He would climb off a jump and then be drawn (as if by hypnosis) to the side of the room with the machines and whack-a-mole type stuff and point to them longingly. We would shake our head and try to get him back to the playing (which was already paid for, mind you) on the big jumps. Alas, once he got those silly quarter machines in his brain, he could not get them out, so we just packed up and headed home.

Do I even have to explain the parallel for us Christians? Distracted by cheaper, less fulfilling, temporary flashy interests when the real fun, real life is already paid for and right in front of us?

It just reminds me of a sermon I once heard where the speaker pointed out how small we pray, how we limit ourselves and we don't even realize it. How the things we ask the Lord for (and sometimes he lets us have, sometimes not) are so much less than what he can and wants to pour out in our lives. Oh, Lord, forgive me for my weak will, my wandering eyes, my less than spirit-filled interests that leave me broke, out of time, and less satisfied than all your good and perfect gifts, you Word, and your kingdom have ever made me.