For Ellen - A Mikey Story

Ok Ellen, I have been sitting
here for a long time trying to
decide what to post,

I'll go ahead and tell our story...

Ellen is our neighbor and the mother
of five active and funny boys.
These boys get on and off the bus
in front of our house. Occasionally
this means they learn things that get
them involved in our messes.

Tuesday was one of those days.

Mikey, Jonathan and Chelsea had been bowling.
While there Mikey decided to jump over the car.

Over the hood from left to right.

Apparently he has done this before because he
was stunned that he did not make it, put a
significant dent in it and drew blood from his
knees. Yesterday he discovered a knot on his
head from the landing, as well.
So this was quite a wipeout.
I was not there,
so I missed this one.
I am thankful that no
bones were broken!

Anyway, When Mikey came in the house on Tuesday
afternoon he was very concerned about how his
father would react to the dent in the car.

As he was standing in the cold
trying to find a way to pop it
out the bus came.

The neighbor boys immediately came over
to see what their friend, Mikey,
was up to. They then promptly went up
and told their mother,
who remembered a gadget they have to pop
dents out of metal.
She called to say she was
on her way to save the day.

Now, we had yet another friend,
named Chris, hanging out with the boys.
He almost immediately
assumed control of this suction device and began
pulling for all he was worth.

It was about this time that Ellen looked at me
and said,
"So soon after that Baptism Post...now this!"

Oh, isn't that the truth.
We had a good laugh.

Baptism does not make us perfect.

Yes, with salvation,
the Holy Spirit does change our hearts and
desires to strengthen our wish to serve the Lord,
but we are still
so human...

Sometimes we still do "stupid Mikey tricks!"
Thats what they call these things at Mikey's work.
Apparently he doesn't save them just for us...
Anyway....

As the boys were only able to get about half of the dent
out, there remains a daily reminder of a bad choice made
last Tuesday. Hopefully this will be enough to make
Mikey at least think before attempting something like
this again...but I have my doubts.

It is one of those things that we know about him
and love him anyway. We actually think that if he
survives himself now those characteristics will take
him far as an adult. Being willing to take risks,
embracing life and always being on the move will be
good things.

Ellen said she wanted to see this posted
here. I was resistant...but..Mikey has
given us an object lesson, or three.

The final lesson I take from Mikey's experience
on Tuesday is this.

Mikey has been forgiven by us for the dent in our
car. But that did not remove the dent.

We can be forgiven for our mistakes and sins,
even as Christians, but consequences, or
dents, remain. It definitely is better for us
to learn from and not repeat our errors and sometimes
these "dents" are just the deterrent we need.

Hope you can learn from Mikey's mistakes and that
you do not attempt to jump over your car today...
as if you were tempted!

I just have to shake my head...

Love,


P.s. There is a story about Jonathan at our Homeschooling Blog....