Jonah loves to ask “why?” He does it all the time and will ask it over and over again. Apparently Missy was the same way when she was little so he must be genetically predisposed to wonderment. When I was a kid I never liked the answer “Because I said so” but all of a sudden it makes way too much sense. Here is an example,
Jonah: What’s that?
Me: That’s the moon…it is way up high in the sky.
Jonah: Why?
Me: Because it is thousands of miles away.
Jonah: Why?
Me: Because a foot is a way to measure distance and if you added up all the feet between us and the moon it would be hundreds of thousands of feet away.
Jonah: Why?
Me: Ummmm…..well….Because I said so!
What else is there left to say? Do I explain to him all the units of measure, the methods they use to measure the distance to the moon, how the moon stays gravitationally pulled to the earth to stay a relatively consistent distance from the earth, or what? There are times I start to explain something to him and realize that no matter how hard I try there is no way he is going to understand. So I am left with this answer.
Now that not only teaches me something about kids it teaches me something about God. Faith requires us trusting that God has answers to things that we may never understand. Faith means God is wiser than we are and even if He tried to explain we still wouldn’t be wise enough to understand. So like Jonah we ask God why and sometimes we don’t get a very clear answer. If my experience as Jonah’s dad has taught me anything it has taught me that when that happens I should be okay with it because God knows better than I do and I am thankful for that. We won’t ever get all the answers. Sometimes the best thing we get is because God said so and we just have to run with it!
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Matt,
You could always say, “Because God made it that way.”
Good point…can I use that when he asks why he should clean up his toys?
Now I see where Jacob gets his questions! And you tried to put it all off on Missy
It won’t last long: education beats the “why” out of you pretty early.
My three girls remind me that I was always teaching.
When I retired c. 1980 I worked with an elder/professor who was on the President’s assement “band.”
I accused him and most educators–especially our youth abandoned to women–of practicing the–
“Paul Masson Theory of Education: We will teach no facts before the child is ready”. Bunko!
Tell the child that it is over 225 thousand miles from the earth. He will be able to tell the other kinds how far it is to the Moon. He will ask how long is a mile: don’t be an absentee parent, tell him how long a mile is. Take him for a ride and show him what a mile is. Take him for a mile long walk. Our kids learned how to estimate how many miles to that big sign.
Whatever he asks he has a right to know. That’s why the command, example, inference and recorded history from the Church in the wilderness onward was:
Acts 15:21 For Moses of old time hath in every city
them that preach him,
being read in the synagogues every sabbath day.
Paul “dialoged” until midnight.
1Timothy 4:13 Till I come, give attendance to [public] reading,
to exhortation [dialog], to doctrine.
1Timothy 4:15 Meditate upon these things; give thyself wholly to them; that thy profiting may appear to all
That is: SPEAK externally and MEDITATE in the heart.
If you follow the direct commands, examples, inferences, history and common sense then when the “wine” is ready it will be in the ceremonially pure vessels.
I am convinced the little guy is going to be pretty smart. An inquisitive mind is a wonderful thing.