HAPPY FATHER'S DAY

Happy Fathers Day! We will celebrate Father’s Day on another day. Because I traveled so much the only special days you could guarantee I would be home was Thanksgiving and Christmas. We always fit celebrations in when we could. Besides we would like to BBQ and today is not a good BBQ day. Looks like rain again.

Church attendance has always amazed me. That is especially true of the first morning service of multiple service churches. I often wonder —where are the people? I do not attend a very large church to begin with, but this morning was very strange. If you count everyone on the platform, the soundman, the video man, the two greeter/ushers and the two women in the nursery there were 14 people with responsibilities. When the worship team began there were six sitting in the congregation. By the midpoint, there were 50 in the audience. Go figure. 9:30 a.m. does not seem too early to me.

There was a young couple sitting a couple of rows ahead of me with the most adorable, affectionate and loving 3-year-old boy. He was a strawberry blond wearing a blue jacket with a stripe down each arm that almost matched his hair. He smiled through the entire service. But because of his age, he was not still for a single moment. Had I my camera with me, I would have taken a hundred shots.

He was sitting on the aisle chair with his arm entwined around his father when I first noticed him. He went from there to hanging off dads shoulder, to being held in dad’s arms to stretching across dad to hug his baby sister in mom’s arms. He was back and forth to standing on his chair, holding hands with dad, hanging on his should being in his arms, off his chair on his chair and repeating the process multiple times in multiple variations. He then moved between mom and dad, pushed them apart and stood holding their arms. He reached to try and hold his little sister. Mom sat down beside him and put little sis in his lap but never let go of her. He hugged her, kissed her and smiled at her all the time lovingly caressing her like he was the parent.

After giving her back to mom, he stood, took an arm of each parent and smiled at them both. Dad picked him up and he gave dad several nose-to-nose rubs and kissed him on the nose. When he got down he went behind mom to three empty chairs beside her and stretched out putting his head on his arms. Both parents looked at him and a moment or two later he was on the floor under the chairs and moving forward. Dad saw him and reached behind mom, caught him by the leg and pulled him back. Dad held him again and the boy caressed dad’s face, smiled at him, hugged him and rested his head on dad’s shoulder. He moved back and forth with these actions through the entire service.

All the time he was doing this he whispered to his dad occasionally. He was never loud, never annoying, but adorably distracting. I was afraid that if I took my eyes off him I would miss something. He was worthy of many photos. I may start taking my camera to church. I’m missing some great shots.