Be the Smile of God
Last week, my 6-year-old came running through the house to find me. His eyes were wide and wild with excitement. “Dad, you’ve got to come look — right now. Come look, come look, come look! Hurry, you’re going to miss it!”
We race back to the living room, to the big window looking out over our backyard. My son’s eyes searched one of the trees, searching and searching, and then he saw it again. “Dad, there! There! Do you see it? Do you see it?” And I did. Probably 25 feet up, in one our tallest trees, was a big raccoon butt comfortably perched on one of the branches. I mean, at first, we assumed it was a raccoon butt — too big to be a squirrel, too small to be a bear, too fat and furry to be a bird.
We sat transfixed, watching that butt, waiting for it to eat or climb or fall or even just scratch an itch. Then it moved. It’s tail swung down where we could see it, with its trademark black and gray stripes. “Dad, it’s tail! It is a raccoon!”
As I looked in my son’s eyes in that moment (and there was so much in those eyes), I heard an older, wiser friend in my ear. He’s in my ear in a lot of these moments with young kids. I heard him pastoring me,
Be thrilled about what they are thrilled about… join them in their joy, however simple and child-like. Whether it’s drawing a stick figure or building a castle out of legos, be lavish with your “Well-dones” and “Good jobs.” Find the good and the glory in everything they do.
He says,
I want my boys to read “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased,” and say, “I’ve seen my dad look at me that way.”
I have categories for fatherly pleasure that echo this gospel of grace. I’ve basked in the blazing brilliance of fatherly delight, and if that fatherly joy is a faint echo of this eternal fatherly joy, then sign me up.
In other words, Be the smile of God to your children.
My older, wiser friend is Joe Rigney. Joe, I see my three children, my calling as a husband and father, my community group, my home, my work, my neighborhood (even the raccoons) all differently because of you. You’ve shown us the shafts of glory, and I’m a different father, husband, and man because of it. You’ve been the smile of God to us.
So, my exhortation for us this morning, church, is this: Don’t miss the raccoons — and rabbits, and blue jays, and monarch butterflies, and really old trees, and the park you’ve been to a thousand times, and Tuesday night dinners, and Thursday night baseball practices. Let every gift of God be an excuse and opportunity to see and enjoy God.
And then, be the smile of God to your children — and your spouse, and your roommates, and your friends, and your neighbors and co-workers. Let your joy teach the people in your life (whoever’s in your life) that Jesus is real — and that he’s the happiest man who’s ever lived.
That no one’s ever truly happy apart from him.