If you want to know what is going on with your adult children, just talk to your grandchildren. They’ll tell you everything.
I like taking my grandsons out one by one. Sometimes I will take the oldest out for breakfast and, at lunchtime, exchange him for the next one.
One Saturday, I took our 9-year-old grandson out, and we had a great time. Titus the Honorable is the old soul of our grandkids. He likes old cars, old clocks, old electronics and old Poppy. I was taking him back home when I told him I wasn’t sure what to do with his 6-year-old brother, Cohen.
“Poppy, Cohen is easy,” Titus said. “Just give him $2 and take him to the dollar store. He’ll spend half a day making up his mind.”
I wonder where he heard that before.
But guess what? He was right. Before the afternoon was over, Cohen had picked up every toy at least once and several twice. After he made his final choice, it was time to take him back home.
Not long ago, Adrian, the mother of my grandkids, had a hectic day getting the two older boys up and off to school. River, 3, was lying on the couch watching the chaos when his mom walked by. “Hey, babe!” River yelled.
“Yes, River?”
“Could you pleaaaaassssseee give me a glass of chocolate milk? It’s been one of those mornings!”
I wonder where he heard that before.
Titus’ third-grade schoolteacher gave each child in her class $3 with the instruction that they all find a way to bless someone. No matter what they did, the goal was to use the funds to help someone else.
Titus had an idea. He wanted to serve hot chocolate and cookies to the families in the waiting room at the local hospital. His mom made a call, and the hospital approved Titus’ project. He is now in the process of finding sponsors to help him with the $150 this ministry will cost.
I wonder where he saw this before.
Children listen and watch the adults around them. They become imitators.
Titus has spent many Wednesdays watching his mom run a clothing room and food pantry. He has seen her love on the homeless and less fortunate. He has been with her as she brought food to someone who was sick or took in a child whose single mom had lost her babysitter.
Jesus learned from His Father’s example too: “Very truly I tell you, the Son can do nothing by Himself; He can do only what He sees His Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does” (John 5:19). And Paul told the Thessalonians, “You became imitators of us and of the Lord” (1 Thess. 5:6a).
Whether we like it or not, our children will imitate what they see. Let’s imitate good things for them or we may only hear, “Could you pleaaaaassssseee give me a glass of chocolate milk? It’s been one of those mornings!”
