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At Thanksgiving, two of my nieces, Brittnee, 9, and Jessica, 6, were determined to catch my cat. I knew they'd been unsuccessful when I overheard Jessica exclaim, "I hate that cat, Billy." Then, unbeknownst to me, Jessica expressed that sentiment with a black marker on a closet door.

When Brittnee came over later in the week, I asked her about the scribbled message on the closet. She quickly explained her sister had done the deed.

I asked Brittnee to scrub the marker off the closet, but she refused. Jessica did it, so she should have to clean it, Brittnee argued.

I countered that since she had been with the culprit during the crime, she shared the guilt. "If you go into a bank with someone who robs it, you'll have to go to jail, too," I explained.

As Brittnee begrudgingly scrubbed the closet door, I heard her mumble, "I know one thing. I'm never going into a bank with Jessica."

—Betty Moore
Peoria Heights, Illinois

During our first snowstorm one year, we had a power outage. Four-year-old Ben ran around the house, trying to turn on all the lights, heaters, and appliances.

After playing a few notes, he triumphantly announced, "Ah ha! The piano still works!"

—Laura Christianson
Snohomish, Washington

My friend's granddaughter once directed a group of four-year-olds in their Christmas pageant. Everything moved along smoothly until the children playing Mary and Joseph "arrived" at the inn in Bethlehem.

"Do you have any room for us?" asked young Joseph.

"No, the inn is full," replied the innkeeper.

"But it's so cold outside, and my wife is going to have a baby," pleaded Joseph. "Don't you have any place for us?"

To the surprise of the director and the audience, instead of showing the couple to the stable, the four-year-old innkeeper replied compassionately, "I'm not supposed to say this, but you come right on in."

—Christy Ehmann
Perkasie, Pennsylvania

When our daughter Gae started kindergarten we issued numerous warnings about the consequences of crossing the intersection without first stopping to look both ways for cars.

One evening as I was scanning the obituaries in the paper, I remarked that a distant relative had gone to be with the Lord.

Without even pausing in her play, five-year-old Gae said, "I guess he crossed the street, huh, Mom?"

—Alma Barkman
Winnipeg, Manitoba

One evening at family devotions, my husband Gordon read from Isaiah 14, the passage in which the king of Babylon (analogous to Lucifer) boasts, "I will be like the Most High."

That night it was three-year-old daughter Jamie's turn to pray. "Dear Jesus," she said, "thank you for letting us read the story about the man who wanted to be the tallest."

—Erica Herra
Aztec, New Mexico

Our daughter Cheri received a miniature nativity scene as a reward for perfect attendance in Sunday school during the fall quarter.

She was so excited that she took it to kindergarten for show-and-tell. When Cheri displayed the prize, her teacher, who happened to attend our church, asked her why she had been given the award.

Cheri proudly replied, "I got it for having perfect intestines."

—Audrey Wiley
Glendive, Montana

I had been singing the song "He's Still Working on Me" around the house for days. One day I heard my four-year-old daughter, Anna, singing the chorus as follows: "It took him just a week to make the moon and stars/The earth and the moon and droopy, droopy drawers."

She was momentarily embarrassed when I corrected her—from "droopy, droopy drawers" to "Jupiter and Mars."

—Reamon Beaty
Fairburn, Georgia

Copyright © 1998 by the author or Christianity Today International/Today's Christian magazine (formerly Christian Reader).
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