The Kite

One day when my son, Jeremiah, was small, he said, “Daddy, I want to fly a kite.” We found a kite and a ball of string wound on a stick and walked to the meadow across the road. The day was bright, and we launched the kite into a steady breeze that swept down from the mountains.

The kite soared, and Jeremiah jumped and shouted and begged to hold the stick. I knelt behind him and placed my arms over his head. He grasped the stick in his little hands, and we flew the kite together. We let the stick spin in our hands, feeding out the string. The kite danced away, ever higher, ever smaller on the steady breeze.

“It feels alive,” Jeremiah said. Soon all the string was out and the kite had become a tiny colorful triangle hundreds of feet above us.

“Supper is ready,” Mom called from the kitchen.

Jeremiah frowned. “Oh, Daddy, do we have to go in?” he pleaded.

Then I got an idea. “Go find a rock,” I said, and he scampered off in search of one. Together we pounded one end of the stick firmly into the earth. We walked backward toward the house so we could watch our kite.

After dark, we returned to the meadow with a flashlight. The breeze was still blowing. We found the stick, and I directed the beam of light up the string as it stretched into the night.

“How can we tell our kite is still in the sky, Daddy?” Jeremiah asked. “I can’t see it.”

“Reach out and touch the string,” I replied. As he held the string in his little fingers, his eyes got big and he smiled.

“I feel it tugging. Will it stay all night, Daddy?”

“Let’s find out.”

In the morning, we went back to the meadow. Jeremiah ran ahead. When I reached him, he was holding the limp string in his hands. The breeze was still blowing, and the stick was still in the ground. But the string was lying on the ground, the far end tangled and broken in the branches of a tree. The kite was gone.

Jeremiah looked into the sky. “Wow, I wonder how high our kite is now,” he said.

“The kite’s not flying anymore, Son,” I said as I gathered up the string. “It crashed.”

Jeremiah looked at me and frowned. “But I thought the string was just so we could get the kite back,” he said.

“No, it can’t fly without the string,” I explained.

He took the wad of string from my hand and pulled it out of the grass. I walked alongside with my hand on his shoulder.

Kites and kids

Like kites, children cannot fly without the restraining freedom of the string; otherwise they would blow wherever the wind might take them. We make the string from many small strands, and each strand is a lesson in how to live in a mixed-up world where God’s truth is too often ignored.

We add a strand when we tell our children that God created them, loves them and has a purpose for their lives. We add another strand when we teach them what Jesus did for them and what they can do for Him.

We add many more when we take them to church, show them how to pray and teach them to be honest, hard-working, respectful, gracious and generous. Strands are added when we go to ball games, dance recitals and church plays; when we tell them we are proud of them; when we ask them what they think; when we forgive them and ask for their forgiveness.

The string gets stronger when we teach them practical, everyday things like how to balance a checkbook; why they should change the car’s oil every 3,000 miles; why they should avoid drugs and alcohol; and why they should stay pure before marriage and faithful afterward. Little by little the string becomes a cord so strong that our children can soar, even in a world where the wind blows from every direction.

The tug of the string

Not long ago, Jeremiah called from the maritime academy he attends. The background noise made it hard to hear.

“I just have a few minutes, Dad,” he shouted into the phone. “We’re heading out to the oil rig soon.”

I heard rumbling, horns blowing and the roar of enor-mous engines. We talked about little things and laughed a lot, and then Jeremiah said, “Hold on for a second,” as the wap-wap-wap of a helicopter passed overhead.

When he came back on the line, he said there was a problem with one of his crewmates, and he wasn’t sure what to do. It was an awkward situation, and he was anxious about it. I listened, asked a question or two and finally told him what I thought was the right thing to do. “Thanks, Dad. That’s a big help,” he said.

Jeremiah and I were a thousand miles apart. This little boy, who walked beside me in the meadow and asked me what made our kite fly, is grown up. I am so proud of him. In those few moments on the telephone, we connected again, as we always have. I could almost reach out and feel the gentle tug of the string.