Whale of a Time!

It was great fun being the fill-in for mommy in Sabbath School this morning for my two granddaughters. When it was time for the big cardboard "whale" to "swallow Jonah", little Julia jumped from her seat and proceeded to crawl through the whale's "belly" from the wrong end! This caused a bottleneck for the kids who had started crawling through the other end to exit from the whale's mouth. I thought for a minute I would have to crawl in there myself to bring her out, but fortunately she listened to the teacher's directions and backed out gracefully on her own. (Actually, she WAS following the Bible narrative when you think about it; Jonah went in the mouth and came out that way too.)

There were other directions that Julia was not as prompt to respond to. And that was anything her older sister suggested or tried to guide her to do. Invariably, Julia did the opposite of what sister proposed.

I wonder if I am as apt to listen to some people's advice as I am to others'. It really does depend on who the person is, doesn't it? I pray that I can be the type of grandmother, mother, wife, sister, and aunt that the valued people in my life will want to listen to. However, I realize that I can't be that for everyone all the time. That's why God recommends a multitude of counselors. We need several people in our lives to give us advice and direction, including and especially those in our church family. I praise God for giving me family of both kinds.

Because we all need direction. You don't want to cause a bottleneck in the belly of the whale now, do you?

You can see the "whale" behind the boat on the left here. 

And this is Julia about to go up for her birthday celebration a few weeks ago.