Last Updated on March 20, 2018

“No sweetheart, you cannot take a picture of it.”

Giant crocodile tears.  With great angst… “I will never see this poo-poo again!”  More loud, dramatic crying. My analytical side watches his face contort, wondering how he gets his mouth open that wide while frowning and screaming.  His face is turning red.  My face registers nothing that I’m feeling.  I’m just watching him, thinking.

A brief video plays in my head.  I see Jon David as a 50 year old man.  He’s on 60 Minutes.  They’re interviewing him because he has saved a picture of every poop since he was 5 years old.  Morley Safer, who looks 120 years old, is amazed that JD sold the pictures for over a million dollars.  “Yes” Jon David says “and I owe it all to my mother who always let me take pictures of my poop as a child.”

No.  No Lisa.  This is not going to happen.

I stand strong.

“Jon David, some things are not meant to be remembered.  Some things, you just have to flush.”

He tries a little longer, remembering how many times I’ve given in lately.  He never wants to throw anything away.  But I stand strong.

“You just have to tell it goodbye.”  “But I’ll never see it again.”  “No, you won’t, my sweet boy.  But that’s okay.  It’s waste. It’s yucky.  It’s not meant to be kept or remembered.  Just tell it good-bye.  And flush.”

With deep emotion, “Good-bye, poo-poo.  I won’t see you again until heaven.”

I’m laughing as I write this, but I held my laughter in when it was happening.  Still, three weeks later, he says that same line each time he flushes.  “Good-bye, poo-poo.  I won’t see you again until heaven.”  I’m not sure how he mixed the ideas of loved-ones waiting for us on the other side and BMs, but it makes me smile and wonder if God will have a special moment with Jon David (and maybe Morley Safer) showing him an amazing, heavenly scrapbook of saved pictures.

So here’s the take-away…

In this life, there are some things we want to hold on to.  They aren’t healthy.  They aren’t beneficial.  They stink.  We cry because we can’t bear the thought of parting with whatever it is.  But our Father says, “You can trust Me.  Go ahead, sweetheart.  Flush.”

 

Lisa Williams

If you recognize my name, it may be because you heard me on Christian radio somewhere, sometime over the past 21 years!  I’ve had the privilege of working in Missouri, Iowa, North Carolina, New Jersey, Florida – and then nationally from 2007 to 2011.

I left a wonderful job with wonderful people to stay home with my sons Jon David (5) and Jesse (3).  Although I would have tried to continue to work full-time and balance it with my home life, I found I didn’t have the capacity to do it all.  So after much prayer, we uprooted our family and moved to Colorado for a great ministry job for my husband, Darin.

I am a happy, stay-at-home, 40-something-year-old mother of 2 very active boys.  Life has become a sweet adventure.

Find me here  God’s Radio Girl on Twitter @GodsRadioGirl  or Facebook

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7 Comments

  1. Linda Dietz says:

    Do you really have a child who hates to say goodbye to poo? So glad you didn’t post a picture. We were ‘friends’ of a young couple who posted a picture of their son’s first poo in the potty. As you correctly say, some things are not meant to be remembered and I would add, seen by friends & family!

  2. Jennifer Goins says:

    I love it! Very funny and so true. Just let go!

  3. Lisa – first of all…..I really miss you on KLOVE! Loved hearing about your little boys. That said, I’m glad you’re still active on FB and now blogging. Keep it up! As far as giving things up, you are right that its sometimes so difficult. Even BAD things, our biggest sins, are sometimes hard to let go of because although the feelings are awful, they are also familiar. So my takeaway from your blog was a little different, but a good reminder that some things ARE meant to be gone. Forever.

  4. Great reading, Lisa. What a pleasure to hear from you again! I understand the stuff to cherish (family, dear friends, that which draws you closer to God, things that strenghthen you, etc.). I also know the obvious stuff to release. But how do you discern the stuff in the middle… and how do you tell the difference?

  5. Thank you for all the comments – so nice to hear from you. After this happened, I kept thinking – I’ve got to write this down. So I’m glad that MomLife gave me the chance.

    Mike – your question is deep! Just this week I had a long conversation with a friend about something that she feels God is asking her to give up. It’s not sin. It’s something that many of us do every day. But for her, it’s a conviction between her and her God.

    Having a close, intimate relationship with Him is the way I personally think that you can discern what things shouldn’t be in your life. I think there is a scripture that talks about things being permissible, but not beneficial. There are some things I have personal convictions about, but I’m not sure any other Christian would feel the same. But the Bible is the basis for all conversations for what is right and wrong, and from that starting place, you discern other things based on His Word and His Spirit.

    Anyway, these are my thoughts before I have to run. There are peanut-butter-covered faces that need wiping and we need to get ready to go 🙂

    hugs

  6. Craig Hunsicker says:

    I try to be sensitive to the Spirit’s prompting. Ephesians 4:30 says we should not quench the Spirit. Sometimes I find myself talking myself out of something because it is permissible (1 Cor 10:23). I.e, “I shouldn’t help that poor man because God says everyone man should provide for his own family” or “I’m going to church so I don’t need to read my Bible THAT much” or “There are people better suited to talk to my friend about his addiction”. I think we get better at these excuses as we get older. Figures that Jesus liked hanging with the children who hadn’t installed all the filters yet.

    Oh, and from an excellent Experiencing God study, the third avenue for discerning “stuff in the middle” is honest and godly relationships.