Maybe I better promise again, as I have before, that I will not use this precious space to always and only talk about my grandchildren. Cross my heart. I realize I’m perilously close to becoming one of those obnoxious grandparents you cross the street (or turn the page) to avoid.
But this week, I have to tell a grandchild story—not because my granddaughter is currently missing her front teeth and is quite possibly the cutest six-year-old on the planet, but because when Edda lost a baby tooth at our house, I learned something I want to share.
You know how it is when baby teeth begin to get loose. Kids wiggle and work those suckers around all day long, trying as hard as they can to speed up the promised arrival of the Tooth Fairy. She happened to be at our house one day when that was happening.
So eager was Edda to reap the fairy’s booty that when she finally got that tooth to turn loose of its mooring, you’d have thought she won a sweepstakes. It was as if she expected the Tooth Fairy to immediately drive up in a prize patrol van with balloons and a giant cardboard check.
Getting to witness our granddaughter’s jubilation was entertaining enough, but the event also prompted some other funny incidents.
One that isn’t relevant to my point, but is too cute not to share, occurred after she had lost a few teeth. Edda was at our house and, waiting until when we were alone in the kitchen, she stage-whispered to me, “Gram, I found the Tooth Fairy’s nest.”
“Really? Where is it?” I whispered back.
“In Mama and Daddy’s closet,” she replied with a conspiratorial glint in her eye.
C’mon—even if you’re anti-Tooth Fairy, don’t you love that?
But the more relevant thing happened when Edda lost a tooth at our house, and it actually inspired me to pause and consider my own life. After Edda’s tooth came out, all day long she kept checking in with me to report, with great amazement and drama, “My tooth is still gone, Gram!”
“Yep, it sure is,” I’d say back.
I don’t know what was going on in her mind. Maybe she was afraid a new tooth might sprout before the Tooth Fairy arrived, thus rendering her ineligible for any prize.
Whatever she was thinking, Edda remained in a state of wonder over that missing tooth all day long.
It was good for me to see that and to be reminded that I should never stop being amazed and filled with wonder over some things in my life.
At the top of that list? The miracle that God saved me.
God—the Creator and Lord of the whole universe; saved—rescued, ransomed, and redeemed; me—the one who doubted, wrestled and rebelled.
He saved me from a small, purposeless life spent building my own pitiful, tiny, temporary kingdom. He saved me from the despair that oozes out of the lie that this world is as good as it gets and we’re all spinning willy-nilly in an out-of-control universe. And He saved me from spending eternity in a place without any shred of love, light, hope and goodness.
It’s far too easy for me to become complacent about the miraculous reality that, as the Apostle Paul wrote, God rescued me from the domain of darkness and transferred me to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom I have redemption and the forgiveness of my sins. (Colossians 1:13-14)
Every single day of my life I should declare, “I’m saved!” … and that reality should fill me with wonder and praise.
May that truth never grow old, even as I do.