583. Lessons from a Toddler with Julie Harwick

Women World Leaders' Podcast

One of the things that is most evident about a toddler is that they don’t know very much. Being so new to the world, they still have a lot to learn. But there’s a lot we can learn from them as well.

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Welcome to Women World Leaders podcast. I’m your host, Julie Harwick. Thank you for joining me today as we celebrate God’s grace in our lives, in this ministry and around the world.

My first, and only grandchild, Sam, is now 16 months old. He lives 2 hours away from us, so I don’t get to spend as much time with him as I’d like to, but we recently went on a cruise together, which gave me seven whole days. There are those who might question the wisdom of taking a toddler on a cruise and there have been moments when his parents have questioned it too, but he’s had a great time and I believe God is using his natural toddler behavior to teach me a thing or two.

One of the first things you notice about a child this age is that they want what they want when they want it. While the rest of us may be on the second course of a very nice dinner, he may not be hungry and just wants to get down and run around. He doesn’t consider that enjoying nice meals is a big part of what makes the adults want to go on a cruise, or that the wait staff is busily moving around the dining room, doing their best to satisfy our every need, nor does he remember that the people around us are also anticipating a calm, relaxing environment where they can enjoy their meals. There’s only one thought on his mind. I’m bored and I want to check this place out on foot. Obviously, he needs to be taught to consider the people around him and their needs. He’s going to have to learn to be patient. He’s only 16 months old. So, what’s my excuse?

I wonder if God doesn’t look at our behavior and sigh, thinking, “they just want what they want, when they want it.” How often do we fall into praying prayers that seem more like a list of demands. When they aren’t answered according to our timetable, we complain and sometimes question if He cares or is even listening. We may even go so far as to take matters into our own hands.

A great biblical example of this is Sarah, Abraham’s wife. She lived at a time when people lived much longer - well over 100 years. When she was in her 80’s, it was more like someone being around 50 today. As she was approaching that age, she had never had the privilege of becoming a mother. In her culture, that was a woman’s highest achievement. Even though God had promised Abraham that he would have a biological heir, Sarah was convinced that she was running out of time. She thought her best chance to be a mother was to use a surrogate, her maid, Hagar. She convinced Abraham that this was how they could have the child they longed for, now. The result was Ishmael, who became the father of the Arab nation. Within a dozen years, God delivered on His promise, allowing Sarah to conceive Issac at the ripe old age of 90. She had little interest in Abraham’s son, Ishmael, now that she had given birth to her own son. This set in motion a conflict between the brothers and their descendants that continues today. Because she wanted a son on her timetable, Sarah went around God’s plan, instituting her own and creating a disaster.

In contrast, another woman in the bible faced a similar circumstance, but she was able to overcome the “toddler way” of thinking. Hannah was one of two wives of Elimilech. That’s hard for us to wrap our heads around, but it was common in her culture. Her sister wife had multiple children and delighted in rubbing Hannah’s face in her lack of offspring. Every year when the family went to the temple to make their annual pilgrimage, Hannah would beg God for a child. Year after year passed with no answer, but she kept asking. It wasn’t easy to keep the faith as the years passed and she shed so many tears and experienced such pain as she prayed, that the priest accused her of being drunk in the temple. When she explained her situation, he blessed her and prophesied that she would come to the temple with a child of her own the following year. According to God’s timetable, she did give birth to Samuel, whom my grandson is named for, within the year. Because she waited for God’s timing, he grew up to be a faithful priest and one of Israel’s greatest leaders.

Another thing little Sam has reminded me of is that there’s a big difference between what we want, and what we need. Sometimes we’re no better at recognizing that than he is. On a cruise, every type of food imaginable is widely available. It is theoretically possible to eat healthy on a cruise, but I’ve never really met anyone who was able to pull it off. There are a wide variety of fruits, vegetables and lean meats, but that’s not what I see people piling on their plates and it’s not what Sam wants to eat. He would happily subsist on nothing but French fries. He’s willing to forgo the fries for various types of bread, especially with peanut butter, or, better yet, cookies or ice cream. Since we’re on vacation, the rules have been relaxed, but his parents don’t want him eating a steady diet of the things he prefers. They know that he wouldn’t be getting the nutrients he needs and the food he loves most could create long-term health problems if he ate too much of it. In the same way, don’t we seek out what we like whether it’s good for us or not? My favorite foods certainly fit into that category as well as how I entertain myself and how I often choose to spend my time. On the other hand, God knows exactly what I need and there are times when that includes pain and suffering. I avoid those things as much as I possibly can, but He knows that they will build my faith and make me more like Him. Even though I recognize that He knows what’s best for me and I desperately want that, it’s easy to lose sight of it and focus on my wants instead. Scripture reminds us that when we recognize our own weaknesses, that’ s when His strength is poured out in us. I like the way the Message puts 2 Corinthians 12:10. “Now I take limitations in stride, and with good cheer, these limitations that cut me down to size – abuse, accidents, opposition, bad breaks. I just let Christ take over! And so the weaker I get, the stronger I become.”

The cruise ship has been a wonderland to Sam. His vocabulary is limited right now, but one word we heard again and again was, “Wow.” The flashing lights and accompanying musical sounds of the casino seem like one giant baby toy to him. There’s a darkened corridor filled with rock-sized sculptures, mirrors and a star-studded ceiling. It makes you feel like you’re walking through an asteroid field in space. He has loved every musical performance from acoustic guitar ballads to Motown. The nightly production shows are his favorite though with flashy costumes, dancers, aerialists, exciting music and incredible special effects. It’s so much to take in for someone who’s never seen anything like it, and he doesn’t want to miss a minute of it. My husband and I tried to give our daughter and son-in-law a break from parenting in the evenings, so we would push Sam around in his stroller and take him to shows. We walked the deck more times than I can count and even when he looks like he can barely keep his eyes open, he will fight to stay awake. He doesn’t want to miss a thing! Many of the staff would recognize us and our efforts to get him to sleep and joke that he would probably outlast us. He was often up until after 10:00 which is pretty late for a toddler, and the effects were quite visible the next day by late morning. When toddlers are tired, they get very cranky and they are definitely not on their best behavior. Adults can be that way too. So many exciting things demand our attention. Online shopping and social media can easily suck me in and cause me to stay up way too late. Others have a hard time saying no to activities and projects that they don’t really have time for. Whether we feel like we’re letting someone down or missing out on something we’d really enjoy, we struggle to recognize our limitations. When we exceed healthy boundaries, we get short-tempered, stressed and sometimes even physically ill. What we really need, just like Sam, is rest. Obviously, God places tremendous importance on the value of rest because He set a whole day aside for it and led by example. I can’t imagine that any of us have ever tackled as large a project as creating the universe. God went at it hard for six days and then He rested. As a completely omnipotent, divine being, did He really need to, or was He demonstrating the importance of rest? He felt so strongly about it, that He made it one of the commandments that He handed down to Moses on His holy mountain. Once Sam is home again, a regular nap and bedtime will be part of his routine because his parents will enforce it. There are times when our heavenly Father enforces rest on us through illness, job loss or a natural disaster. But those are pretty extreme measures that most of us would prefer to avoid. Sometimes a nap can make all the difference.

Sam’s only been walking for about a month now and he’s doing really well, but occasionally he still looks a little like a drunken sailor. Sometimes his momentum gets ahead of his legs and he does a face plant. Rarely does he make a big deal out of it. He usually just gets up again and keeps going. Sometimes, he can fall two or three times in a row, but he’ll just keep his eyes facing forward, get up, and keep going. He doesn’t look around to see if anyone saw him fall or berate himself for being clumsy. He has a destination in mind and that’s all that matters. I think there’s a lesson in that. As we walk through this life, we often trip over hidden obstacles or lose our balance. We fall, or maybe more aptly, fail to reach our intended destination or become the person we really want to be. But rather than just pick ourselves up and keep going, we look around to see who may have witnessed our failure and even if there’s no one to mock or criticize what just happened, we take on that role ourselves. We are our own worst critics, but it’s something we can learn to overcome if we choose to. I think this is exactly what the Apostle Paul was talking about in Phillipians 3 when he said, “Forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press onward toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” Paul certainly had a past that could’ve kept him locked in self-recrimination and shame. Everyone knew that he had been the chief persecutor of the followers of Jesus. We know that he was responsible for Stephen’s death, and likely there were many others. After his miraculous conversion on the road to Damascus, he had to prove himself as a trustworthy and genuine believer. There were probably some who couldn’t forget the atrocities he had committed and never really trusted him. But he didn’t let that stop him. He recognized that the moment he encountered Jesus, he had become a new man and his previous sins no longer defined him. As he stated in 2 Corinthians 5:17 “This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone. New life has begun.” Paul is all the evidence we need that we can overcome any failure. It’s not a question of if we fall, but when. And when it happens, the best thing to do is just get up and keep moving toward that prize.

Sam is learning new words and skills every day and it’s exciting to see that. There are some very special things that we’re enjoying during his toddler-hood, but we don’t want him to stay a toddler forever. We realize that it will take many years for him to mature into a full adult, but that’s our ultimate goal for him. As much as we love holding him when he’s sleepy and laughing at his antics, we are eager to see him grow and learn even more. I think God feels the same way about us. He understands that growth takes time and He loves us at every stage of our journey. He delights at every new skill we master and every obstacle we overcome. He loves us right where we are now, but He wants so much more for us. Colossians 1:28 sums up exactly what He calls His servants to do. “He is the One we proclaim, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone fully mature in Christ.”

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