January 12, 2008

• Happy Birthday Curt!

  

  Happy Birthday Curt, the great man who began as this young boy.

  I’ve heard a great idea which I’ve only achieved once: sending flowers to your husband’s mother on your husband’s birthday thanking her for her work in bearing and raising him. 

  I want to honor my in-laws as we celebrate another year of Curt’s life.  They played a huge role in shaping and forming him. Curt wrote the words better than I could, so I will share them with you.  Here is an excerpt of a note he wrote them in 2006.

  I am not sure how old I was, but I guess I was five or so
  when bedtime prayers took a twist, and a new activity was initiated.  Before ‘Now I lay me down to sleep…’ and
  blessings were petitioned for every creature I could think of; I was now
  required to learn to recite the Ten Commandments. 

   This seemed like a good idea.  Since God was God, I accepted the argument
  that we ought to know how He wanted us to live. 
  Call me weird, but no one has ever been able to convince me otherwise. There
  I was, lying in bed, repeating every word my father or mother said first.  I finally, bit by bit, one command after
  another, nailed all ten! 

  I never forgot the gist of the thing.  I found out later I had learned a shortened
  version, but the basic list would go with me wherever I went.  I knew what God did not want me to do, and I
  knew as a result what He did want me to do.

   The basic list did not include the inherent blessings and
  curses attached to the commandments, but my parents had not neglected
  them.  Their commentary and explanation
  impressed upon me the seriousness of disobeying God.  I remember telling my mother how Bobby Martin
  would show off by folding his eyelids back and displaying a hideous face.  She warned me that God had the power to make
  Bobby’s eyes stay that way!  Whoa!  This was my first exposure to the doctrine of
  heart hardening, and I have since endeavored to steer clear.  Along the way I have broken every one of
  God’s holy commandments.  But I have not
  done so without shame, guilt, and a condemning conscience.  Praise God for sorrow that leads to
  repentance!

  The Law of God continues to grow on me, and in me, thanks to
  faithful parents who night after night drummed
  it into my spongy brain.  My hope is that
  my children and my children’s children will love God’s Law with an even greater
  fervency.  What began for me in the top
  bunk of the front bedroom at 10111 Washington
  each night before I went to sleep — may it continue throughout all generations.

  Happy Birthday Curt!  I ought to thank God every day for you.  I don’t, but I ought to.  I do thank God for you often.  You have been one of God’s best gifts to me. 

  

  • 4:52 pm
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