Letters and Dinosaurs

So, the latest game (for Caroline and I) is to play the "Wheels on the bus". A slight bit like Calvin Ball, "Wheels on the bus" can exist outside where it involves running around the tree in our front yard singing various verses of the hit song. However, lately it is more interesting for Caroline to request that I make up new verses all the time. Current verses that may or may not be in the original (which we have copies of in at least two books) - The cars on the bus ("boom, boom, boom"), the penguins ("I can't fly"), the spoons ("Scoop, scoop, scoop"), the dogs ("Woof, woof, woof"), the mommies (you think you've heard this one, but Caroline learned a different version from Mommy - must ask Mommy to hear that one), the cats, the sheep ("Don't take my wool"), the cows ("moo, moo, moo"), the Carolines ("this is not a crisis..."), the Ronnies (our dog, "I Hate thunder"), the Batmans (he says "I am fat" because he is), Stegosaurus', Bill the Dinosaurs (a T-Rex I think), Fred the Dinosaurs (like Bill, only yellow), Triceratops' ("Get out of my way"), Racoons ("I can fight", because I only know what I learned from Old Yeller), etc.

ANYWAY, tonight, while she was in the bathtub she asked for several new verses based upon letters she was picking up (she has these little letters that stick to the walls of the tub). Letters she knows: 't', 'g', 'q', 'x', 'm', 'w'... She mistook 'o' for 'g' and the number '1' for the number '2'. It was amazing. Not because she is advanced (like every kid, I'm sure she is in some ways and not in others), but because she has learned so much! It is just fun to watch and participate alongside! Crazy crazy crazy...

Let me know if you have any fun verse ideas...

The Record of Christians

So, I'm in Baltimore, and I just got finished speaking to an amazing group of senior high and junior high students.

Throughout the week I was loosely encouraging those who were already Christians on what I had learned about apologetics in 2008... That is a fancy way of saying I used what I know of Tim Keller's book "Reason for God" to encourage them on interacting with people who have these blocks between them and the Lord like - Suffering, the Exclusive Claims of Christianity, etc.

One of the hardest ones to deal with is the Record of Christians...

So, on the cab ride home from Dinner (which couldn't have lasted more than 10 minutes), I was interrogated by a poor 72 year old Jewish man who was beat up repeatedly in school because "Jews killed Jesus"... I think I got a semi-free pass for not being Catholic. At the end he said, "Well, someone needs to ask forgiveness for all that..." and I leaned forward and I asked his forgiveness, and he granted it - said he wasn't talking about me (to which I said I was in that tradition so I was asking anyway) - and he thanked me... And I upped my tip...

Then he came back to give me money back because he remembered that our first stop was for him to get gas...

We re-lived both the forgiveness and the tip again.

I suppose Tim Keller is right. I suppose I was right to encourage the kids to simply apologize and offer forgiveness when and where we can... Being right doesn't make me any less sad that this poor man had to fight many days of his elementary school and junior high years. I wonder if I could have talked to him about Jesus if he hadn't been beat up so much when he was young.