If you go to the homes of each of my nieces and nephews and to the bedrooms of each of my own children, you will find the words above….all written in the hand of their Grandmother, on the khaki pants of their Great-grandfather (literally) .
These words are particularly poignant because my Grandfather did not have a high school education… if memory serves me, I believe he left formal schooling around the age of 13…not necessarily by choice, but by need.
And yet, he grew from that little 13 year old boy into a successful farmer and wise and Godly man.
Papaw knew the value of a good formal education because his own was cut short. Too short. And not really by his choosing.
And, in that cutting, grew a deep desire to have “his own” receive what he did not.
But, as important as I believe “schooling” was to my Papaw Perry, I believe he wanted his family to grow in faith more.
And not just a little, obligated, stingy faith, but a large, committed and deep-rooted faith. A faith which comes from study and work and good thinking.
Papaw had a hard, extended, long reaching work ethic. His mornings started early when most people are still numb in sleep. And, if you were “his” your worth ethic had better measure up…
Papaw was a farmer…A wheat harvester…A custom combiner
A man of the earth….starting from nothing and growing it big.
My image of my Papaw was that everything about him was “Big”…he was big, his hands were big, his words were big and booming.
His desire to tease me was big.
He teased me about boyfriends, about kissing boys, about marrying boys.
He teased me so much that around the age of kindergarten, I told him “Granny can come back to visit but that he had better stay home.”. And, trust me, he never let me forget it!
I can still hear his big, happy laughter as I said those words…
And, likewise, I still cherish his kind and soft whispered words to me that he was sorry if he teased me too much and that he hoped I would let him come see me again. He melted my heart….in the way only a beloved Papaw can.
I confess that I don’t rightly remember my Papaw saying the “what you put between your ears only God can take away” words directly to me, but my Mama did. It was often that she reminded me to go to school…stay in school….love school because that was the one thing no one could take away from me.
I think, as well, it was not just formal education that Papaw was talking about, it was growing in life. Mama also said often to me, “when you stop growing, you start dying” and I can see at 49 that this is true.
Growing is important.
Growing in all ways….spiritually, emotionally, socially, physically…
If you are growing toward something, then you are using yourself to move forward, think forward, live forward.
And, that is good.
The more you are growing, the more you are able to see the wrongness of wrong and rightness of right…
Growing as you age engages your heart to realize that you just don’t know everything. That old adage,” the older I get the more intelligent my parents becomes”, is true. And, that applies to many things…and people.
The older I get the more I realize my parents were right about many things. I do.
The older I get, the more I realize that wrong thinking is just a part of immaturity regardless of your age, but that living life can bring you through it and into mature thinking.
I also am realizing that part of what Papaw was saying it to learn to think for yourself.
In my life, I did not do that well.
I was a child who wanted to please others, and in that desire, did what I thought others wanted me to do rather than thinking through what God would have me do.
I am working on this.
It is hard.
I hate conflict. I hate putting others out. I hate for anyone to be upset with me. I hate not to give others what they want.
But, I am learning.
And, I guess I come to this later in life than I should. But, I am learning, God’s opinion is the only one which matters, Living by what I learn from His Word is the only “book” which is important to etch on my heart.
I am learning that it REALLY DOES matter what I put between my ears because that is who I become…it cannot be helped. I am a sponge and if I put the value of worldly things, people, life in between my ears, I become worldly.
But, if I strive daily and all day long to put Godly things, people and life between my ears, then I grow more like what I want to be.
And, it’s not that I have not known this truth…I think it is that I really didn’t appreciate the value of this truth as much as I do now.
We have always told our children, “you are what you read, listen to, walk with”…..and, you are.
I struggle as I watch them put things between their ears which I know to be worldly, and I battle with them at times, striving to let them know that it really does matter….to steer clear and not open the door to worldliness…
I think they listen and know what I say is truth…they just don’t grasp the depth of the truth of it yet and therefore, like most of us, walk where I wish they wouldn’t at times…
What’s a mother to do?
Well, I do what my 73 year old mother told me recently she did and still does (and that she had recently learned the value and importance of doing). I pray not only that my children grow through this life preparing for the next staying close to Godliness…walking THROUGH this world and TO His world. I pray not just for their protection….I pray for their safekeeping.
That God would steer evil away from them and put Godly in front of, behind, and to the sides of each one of my children. That Boldness in Him become theirs.
We are not yet there…
But, Mama says….they are closer than they were because of prayer.
My Papaw Perry, Mama’s Daddy, was a big man…and, I have every confidence that he was big in not only the education of our minds, but also in the education of our hearts and spirits as well.
Papaw knew.
Papaw shared….and, that sharing has flowed through the lives of his children, his children’s children, his children’s children’s children, all these years….
“Remember, what you put between your ears, only God can take away from you.”
Blessings,
Lesa
