Emergency Call

I have been thinking of things that happened when Brenna was young. Those are precious memories.

When she was in kindergarten, the school asked parents to set up a system on what a child were to do if the school had an emergency and sent the kids home early. Specifically, what should the child do if no one were home upon arrival.

I showed Brenna how to speed dial her dad—this was in the days before cell phones—at work. I cautioned her to only call that number when there was an emergency.

Not long after that conversation, I heard Brenna talking to someone. The phone hadn’t rung and no one else was in the house. As I came down the hall I heard:

“Dad, this is an emergency. You HAVE to stop at Dairy Queen and get fish sandwiches for dinner.”

She listened a few seconds, and then I heard, “Dad, this is a REAL emergency. You have to go to the Dairy Queen.”

Brenna was sitting on the kitchen counter, her feet tucked under her, with her little body curled around the phone. I couldn’t help but smile at her emergency call.  I took the phone away to talk to my husband. He asked if I were sick—what was the emergency.  The emergency? Roast for dinner.

To Brenna’s five-year old mind, roast for dinner was a big emergency.

I have thought of her vision of an emergency, but I also thought of her dad’s response. He stopped at Dairy Queen on the way home and brought her a fish sandwich.

Isn’t that like God does for us? We come to him with our emergencies, and when sometimes our emergency is far-fetched, he grants our request.