I woke up this morning wondering what’s for dinner.

All day long, I have been asking my Father that question. What’s for Dinner?

Ethan came to me last night, I was in the living room, sitting on the couch writing on my laptop. Brian and Jenn Johnson were singing the beautiful hymn “Here is Love,” through our stereo. The lyrics make me melt every time I hear them,

“Here is Love, vast as the ocean, loving kindness like a flood…”

Ethan yelled over the music. It took me a moment to figure out what he wanted. It shouldn’t have, its almost always one of three things, XBOX, permission to go down the street to his friend’s house, or food.  I turned the music down just in time to hear him proclaim that he was “starving dad!” “He is always “starving,” I thought fondly.

I looked at him in mock confusion, “Starving!? Again? Didn’t you just have a banana, some chips, and a granola bar…”

I looked at my wrist for effect. As if I was checking my watch. The fact that I don’t wear a wristwatch added the desired sarcasm to my performance.

“…when was that, like, half an hour ago?” I asked.

I have often given Ethan the definition of starving. When finished defining the word, we will both agree, he isn’t actually “starving”, just hungry, or bored. However, my son’s memory seems to be flawed, as often, later in the same day, he will forget the definition of the word and use it incorrectly again.

I could hear Brian singing in the background,

“Grace and Love like mighty rivers poured incessantly from above.”

You know, it’s amazing; Ethan has never been “starving”. We are so blessed! Ethan has never gone without food for any period of time in which he could truly use words like starving, or desperate, or even a simple word like need. Ethan has never truly needed food.

“Grace and love…”

We once again investigated the word “starving”. We once again agreed that he was in fact not starving, just hungry. And then he asked an awesome question.

“Dad, what’s for dinner?”

That question is very telling regarding our relationship. First, Ethan expects to eat. Second, he acknowledges that it is both my role to feed him and to help him decide what he eats. Ethan’s question reveals that he and I are in a healthy father-son relationship.

I am a good father, I tell my kids all the time and they believe me. But as amazing a father as I am, I don’t hold a candle, or a firebrand, or any other source of light to my heavenly Father.  He’s the cat’s meow… yeah, I’m bringing it back.

“What do you want to eat?” I asked. Ethan had some great ideas!

My prayer today, “Father, what’s for dinner? Oh and Dad, I have some great ideas.”

“If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.” (John 15:7-9)

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