Thought of the Day 07.21.08

I love to get a good night’s sleep. It’s one of my favorite little things in life. Of course, it’s completely incompatible with having lots of kids, so I accept the loss as a rational sacrifice for things more significant than extra sleep. Nonetheless, each time I have to make that choice, it’s freshly unpleasant.

Which is why I was annoyed the other morning when Spencer woke me up by thrusting my open cell phone into my face and telling me someone was on the phone. I answered it, had a conversation I didn’t really want to have so early in the morning, and then hung up. Then I had a choice to make: scold him, let it go, or gently thank him for trying to be helpful and remind him that I only want to answer the phone myself.

See, when we expect to make someone happy by doing a loving thing for them and instead they become angry at us, it’s devastating. And the exasperation this creates is exactly what the Bible warns fathers to not cause our children, lest they lose the heart to do good deeds (Colossians 3:21).