Of Mile Markers and Satan

Good morning friends,

Today I’d like to share a personal story. It’s a story I’ve told many times but I’ve never written it out. So we’ll see how this goes.

It doesn’t seem that long ago, but I remember that our youngest son Jefferson was 7 and he’s 20 now, so no matter what it feels like it must have been 13 years ago. Wow! Makes me feel old!

It was back in the early days of our fresh-from-our-organic-farm food delivery work. It was a typical Saturday and our family had been up working since 5:00 in the morning packing food orders for our PA drop-points.

For this day I was the farmer doing delivery for what we call “The Yardley Route”. Those of you from the Yardley, Bristol and Southampton delivery locations, you know who you are and, yes, it was your route I was running that Saturday. :)

It was going to be about a 9 hour trip, leaving after the packing finished at 7:30 and getting back to the farm around 4:30. So I was glad for Jefferson's company. Even at 7 a boy can be a huge help at the drop locations... sliding full coolers to the back of the bus to be unloaded at each stop, helping customers to find their correct cooler, and then bringing the coolers back as they are emptied.

But truth be told, as any parent will understand, I was also looking forward to quality time with my son. We would have 3 hours out and 3 hours back of talk time, plus the hours in between working together.

I don’t remember the outgoing trip that much. I’m sure we talked about random things that interest boys and Jefferson likely slept a little. 5:00 is an early start for a boy. I just know that we enjoyed the father-son time together. But it was on the 3 hr drive home that we got into the part of the story that I remember so well.

Somehow we got to talking about questions. As I recall, I took the moment as a teachable one and was explaining to Jefferson that there are different kinds of questions and some are harder than others.

We talked about "where" questions and "what" questions and "when" questions. I told him these kinds of questions are usually easy to answer.

To illustrate this point I used the little green mile marker signs which we were passing regularly as we drove.

I explained that if someone were to say, "Where is the mile marker?", the answer is obvious. It’s at the side of the road. What color is it? It’s green. What color are the letters? They are white. When did they put the signs up? Likely whenever they built the road. What is the sign made out of? It’s steel. Easy answers, because, what, where, and when questions deal with mostly observable facts.

But then I explained to him that "why" questions are different. They tend to be hard because we do not always know why.

So again I used the mile markers as examples.

Why are mile markers green with white letters? We do not really know. Some road signs are yellow with black letters and they work too. We could make some guesses and they might make sense, but because we were not a part of the decision we’d not be sure if our answer was actually the reason or if it is just a reason that makes sense to us.

Or another why question:

Why are the numbers on the marker “Mile 235” arranged up and down vertically like a tower of numbers instead of written out in a line horizontally like most other signs? Again, we really don’t know for sure. We can come up with ideas and some of them might be close or even follow good logic. But it is hard to be 100% sure why.

I could tell Jefferson’s curiosity was piqued by this discussion on questions and I wondered what all he was thinking, so I decided to make myself vulnerable. I told him he could ask me any question he wanted to. Any question would be ok. I promised him I’d never laugh at him or make him feel his questions were silly. Any and all questions would be fair game.

For the record, I did give a few disclaimers. I told him he could ask any question but I’d not promise to answer every question. First, I explained that maybe I couldn’t. I myself may not know the answer to his question. In that case we’d just discuss the possibilities together. Secondly, maybe he was not old enough for the full answer to his question. “It might be too heavy for him to hold”, I think is the way I put it. In that case, I promised to write it down and answer him fully when he’s ready.

Jefferson seemed interested in this proposal and looked out the window for a few minutes. I could tell he was thinking. I sort of held my breath wondering if I knew what I had gotten myself into. I think I was about half expecting him to ask something that maybe he was not ready to know quite yet... maybe something on the facts of life or along that line.

Whatever I was bracing for, I know I was not prepared for what I heard. I simply was not expecting this from my seven year old.

Jefferson turned from his window and, looking at me very seriously, said, "Daddy, since God is stronger than anyone and he can do anything he wants to, why doesn't he just kill Satan?"

This story has gotten long enough for one post. So the rest of it will need to wait for next week.

In the meantime... What would you have said? How would you answer your 7 year old?

Blessings until next time!

Your Mennonite Christian farmer friend,

Edwin Shank

"Intensely striving to be... A follower of Jesus indeed... In whom there is no guile"

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