Do You Know Where Your Kids Are Swimming?

By far, one of the highlights of our Colorado adventure trip was a morning at the natural hot springs.  I didn’t have to hang off a hundred-foot cliff by a tiny rope.  I didn’t have to walk 40 miles, up hill, both ways, in thin mountain air.  No one was falling into the icy river as we navigated rapids designed for Olympians.  Nothing but a natural hot tub…now that’s my idea of adventure.

The hot springs were divided into three pools.  One was a tepid, playing pool.  Kids were playing volleyball, chicken fighting (don’t tell the lifeguards), and swimming laps in that pool.  It was cool upon entering, but one could swiftly adapt….like most pools on a warm summer’s day.

One pool was about the temperature of a traditional hot tub.  But it was huge.  So it was kind of like being in a pretty hot bath with 113 of your closest friends.  It was more of a therapy pool – no playing, just relaxing.

Then there was the final pool – a crescent shaped pool with lots of warning signs about the heat.  And rightly so!  I’m not sure, but I think this pool might have actually been the first model for the Lake of Fire.

So of course, our teenagers were trying to man up and just jump in the crescent pool and stay in.  Few of them could.  It was just way too hot.

I noticed, though, that a few of them would get in and just muscle through the obvious burn.  They would sweat.  Their skin turned red (probably a rise in blood pressure).  Even though they knew it was hotter than a really hot place, they wanted to be in that pool.

I found a fascinating distinction between that pool and the others.  In the other pools, it was them temperature of the water that seemed to change.  Realistically, that didn’t happen.  Bodies just acclimate to the temperature of the pools.  But it seemed as though the cool water pool got warmer – and the traditional hot-tub water got cooler.  Kids were able to stay in both pools for prolonged periods without danger or threat as their bodies became accustomed to the water temperatures.

But in the SUPER HOT tub – the water temperature didn’t seem to change.  The water didn’t get cooler – people just got hotter….and hotter….and hotter.  And even though they were burning up – even undergoing physiological changes – they refused to get out of the pool.

It was a perfect microcosm of our student community.

We had kids who wouldn’t go anywhere near that pool.  It was too hot.  Period.  They didn’t need to try it out.  They already knew – just stay away.

We had kids who knew it was hot, but just wanted to give it a try.  And as soon as they jumped in, they jumped right back out.  Too hot.  They tried it once.  Maybe to say they had tried it.  Maybe out of curiosity.  But it didn’t take long in the pool to help them realize they just weren’t cut out for that kind of heat.

And then there were those few kids who just dived head-long into the cauldron.  Smiling as their blood pressure rose – the sweat beaded up on their foreheads – scoffing as friends tried to get them to come out of the pool.

Left in that pool long enough – according to the warning signs – people develop nausea, dizziness, even the possibility of stroke.  Being in that pool for prolonged periods of time is life threatening.

Incidentally – there was only a small, concrete wall separating the hot tub from the hotter-than-hell tub.  Wouldn’t take much for kids to jump from normal hot to life-threatening hot.

Do you know which pool your kids are swimming in?

My MacGyver Wife & Our MacGyver God

Have you ever been out of town when it seems like all Hades breaks loose at home?  Our family always plans for the most unexpected things when I’m gone over the summer.  One year my wife went into pre-term labor while I was on a mission trip.  Another year the wheel fell off our car as my wife drove over the JFK Causeway, almost sending her and my two young sons over the edge of the bridge and into the Gulf.  One year our city was evacuated for a hurricane the day before we were to leave…

My wife has learned to be pretty resourceful in my absence.  She stopped her labor.  She towed the car.  She packed camp luggage amidst our evacuation supplies and left me there when she returned home.  She is a fully capable woman who doesn’t need me to fix one thing for her.  Usually she is fixing stuff for me.

But that never impedes my feeling like I MUST DO SOMETHING when things go amiss and I’m away from home.

This year, my wife didn’t go to camp with us.  She had an opportunity to participate in a ministry opportunity that we knew had been given by God – so she abandoned her plans join us in Colorado for a week of adventure camp in order to pursue a different call God had given her.  (Incidentally, in twenty years, I’ve done this trip five times and she’s never been able to attend…a fact she rarely lets me forget!)  The day before she was to fly out, she found out a clerical error had been made and her flight had not been booked.  Now in a normal city, this might not be such a big deal.  But we live on the edge of the earth.  It can be difficult to get flights to and from anywhere on any kind of time schedule that’s convenient for the receiving end of the flight.  Not only that, but she was FINALLY going to get to join me for this amazing camp opportunity – and it appeared that she had foregone that opportunity for nothing.

In addition, she woke up with an abscessed tooth.  I knew when I got the text saying she was going to the dentist, it was bad.  Have you seen those cartoons where the title character gets hit in the face with a frying pan and his or her teeth just crumble into a billion pieces as they fall out of said mouth?  Yeah, that could happen to Katie and she STILL wouldn’t go to the dentist.

So a perfect storm had ensued at home – I was stuck on the side of a mountain three states away and in roaming service, if I was lucky enough to have service at all.  There was literally not a thing I could do.  I was sharing this frustration with my leadership team…in a very frustrated way.  One of my leaders said ’Wow – my cousin works at such-and-such airline, but they don’t fly out of Corpus.  I wish I could pull some strings for you.’  Then, in an amazing display of wisdom, she said ‘I guess we just need to pull the right strings. We should pray.’

Duh.  What a doofus. Griping had been my string of choice.  Praying, honestly and ashamedly, hadn’t even occurred to me.  I didn’t need to fix a thing.  Not because my wife is like the MacGyver of youth ministry spouses.  Not because it was up to me to make something happen.  Not because we had planned for every eventuality.  Simply because God was in control.

I seem to forget – on a pretty regular basis – that nothing in my life takes Him by surprise.  All my days are numbered – he knows all my hairs, gray and otherwise – not a tooth falls to the ground that He doesn’t know about it.  He had it all under control – even if it didn’t turn out the way WE had envisioned it would.

So I just spent the next few hours praying in between hiking, luggage unloading, cooking dinner, and sitting in the Jacuzzi (hey – I had already spent my one night in a tent!)  When I finally got cell service again – a ticket had been purchased, a tooth had been pulled, a prescription had been administered and luggage was locked and loaded and waiting for the airport.  Apparently, not only do I have a MacGyver-wife, I also have a MacGyver God.  May I never forget it!