The hot water heater stopped heating my water on Tuesday. We kept waiting for it to heat back up, after our power loss, due to a nearby tornado touch-down on Tuesday night…but it didn’t. Just as my husband and I were about to leave for a short anniversary trip, we came to terms with the fact that the schedule we were facing upon returning was not conducive to the absence of hot water in our bathrooms (or dishwasher or washing machine). My man is a handyman par excellence. He is NOT a man who can easily pay someone else to do, while we are gone, what he knows how to do himself. So, of course, we didn’t go. (It was my decision, in view of my schedule, for the record. (It’s podcast week, company week, and a four-day-out-of-town trip week, for me.)
In the process of pulling out the dryer to get to the hot water heater, lots of debris (a.k.a filthiness…and lost socks and tiny toys) emerged from beneath the dryer. A sealed envelope with two love birds hand-stamped on the front emerged in the pile of dust and miscellanea. I opened the sealed envelope thinking, “I wonder what nice note I failed to give my husband…and on what anniversary?”
The envelope contained the following weeklong checklist I’d prepared for a homeschooling moms’ retreat several years back. It was a list I needed to see while watching my husband laboriously removing that mammoth water heater from that small laundry hall, while I was working like crazy, too, and bemoaning the fact that I was home rather than in the Westin, where we had planned to be that night. Maybe someone else needs the list, too.
Here’s the handout the ladies all received that year in their own sealed envelopes. Of course, this list is adaptable to all Christian families, homeschooling, or not.
For your faithful provider:
Pick a week in each month and complete the following: Then start over and pick a week next month. Fill your year with gratitude and respect for this man who makes your homeschool possible:
Massage Monday–Massage night. You’ve got this. Just five minutes while you thank him for making your home school possible.
Text Tuesday–Text him, out of the blue, about how your world is better because he is a faithful provider.
Wisdom Wednesday–Wisdom WonderMan. On the way to Bible class, thank him for trying so hard to be a wise spiritual leader. Then at Family Bible Time, have each child thank God for a wise dad who makes good decisions for your family.
Thanking Thursday–Thank God. Spend five minutes in prayer while the kids are napping or working. Spend the whole five minutes thanking God for various attributes in that man that are good and praying about the ones that are challenging.
Fix-up Friday–Fix-up day. Do casual Friday, but still make it a make-up day or a good-hair day. Think about three things you love about your husband’s appearance and tell him throughout the day, even if you have to text him.
Suggestive Saturday–Suggestive day. Say or do one sexually suggestive thing. This will make his week-end. I know you can think of something he would love!
Servant Sunday–Servant day. Have each child think of one special thing he/she can do for Dad that day, and help him accomplish it. Coffee in bed. Brag on his sermon, if he is a preacher. New socks in his drawer. Money out of piggy banks for a milkshake on the way home from Sunday night services. Teens should write notes of appreciation or send a meme or GIF that says as much. Give dad a baseball that has a sweet note about how he’s the MVP (Most Valuable Parent) in the child’s world. Girls can ask dad for a breakfast date on Monday morning. Just be creative!
Answer (begin researching and compiling information) important questions as immediately as possible.
I’m pretty sure I heard 30-plus speeches this weekend about Joseph and how his brothers meant the pit, the slavery and the bloody coat, for evil, but God meant it all for good. I heard a lot about Job and even more about the intended and massive eternal good that God meant through the abuse that happened at the cross. 
the things that occur in my life. Events, occurrences, schedules and mishaps are not all about me; but of course they ARE all about Him IN me and in you and in every faithful child. How can He take every single one of His called children this weekend across multiple convention sites and make the paths of our lives converge into one good thing? It’s because we are called according to His purpose and we claim that promise from an infinitely resourceful God. As one of my grandchildren said in her speech, “Like I said, I can’t even imagine it. But it’s no wonder I can’t even imagine it. God said He can do exceedingly, abundantly more than I can even ask or imagine.”
It strikes me on reflection that we are blessed in His family with so many intersections at a big event like Lads to Leaders. This (Nashville convention, this year) was the biggest convention in the history of Lads and it was full of wonderful cross-over reunions for most of us.
Keepers award and a couple of them achieved the Good Samaritan Award. 
Lads is an intersection of the sixties-something me and the six-year-old me. People I’ve known from the Adamsville church for all my life walked up and said “I’m ____________.” Then there were big embraces and fond memories just came pouring back. I’m so thankful for a childhood among His faithful people.
Lads is an intersection of Christian camps. Teen girls, over and over, shouted “Mrs. Cindy!” We took pictures and we said lots of “Are you coming this summer?” And there were lots of “OHHH yes! I can’t wait.”s. I’m thankful for youth events that bind them (and us) together.
can imagine!
She just keeps pushing them, putting in the effort to keep them going, switching hands every now and then, breathing deep and pushing them again. This morning Hannah woke up with an achy throat and body and she asked herself if she could really adult today. Then she put in a day of school, took them to piano and karate and gave the meds to the one who is getting past strep. She talked with their doctor and she postponed her own doctor appointment to keep their “swing” going. I asked her last night about doing something fun with a friend. She said “What would that even look like right now?’ She spoke twice last weekend at a ladies day and is gearing up to go speak four times at a retreat where we both will speak (and Colleyanna will, too.) Somehow she got one ready for a 59/60 on the Bible bowl test and she has three who are, altogether, doing 13 events at Lads to Leaders. Her house sometimes looks like a tornado has hit (like mine) and, on most weeks, a big colony of ants could probably live a long time in her van. She had to go around the outside of her house for one of the kids and make sure every window was locked last night before bed. Tonight she is vigilant with one who is afraid of the storms outside. If they only knew how big are the storms from which she daily protects them. (All good parents do this!) She travels four-plus hours (in a day) every other week to get the kids to an important appointment. She stays an extra 45 minutes or an hour after worship services so her kids can play foursquare and Frozen with the children of other faithful people. She has struggled through some hard things to keep them in the best academic and social place. Most of all, she is doggedly determined to give them the best spiritual place. She holds them up before God every day and night and she holds it together when I think I would buckle under the weight. She is thankful when I might be bitter; hopeful when I might surrender. I do not tell her enough, so 
children all over the kingdom, and speaking to ladies groups on a regular basis. (As an aside, we are equally amazed at the artistic talent that she has given the kids, because we KNOW it did not come through any Colley genes.) 
Somebody in your congregation, if you are a young church, is already taking the time and effort to sanitize the nursery class each week. Every little plastic car that rolls on the table while they are singing “The wheels on the car go round and round…on the way to Bible class/“ has to be rubbed down with a germ-killing wipe. The linens on the changing table have to be washed 
and replaced. The table -top that has their little bucket safety seats has to be disinfected and the little clocks they hold during “Tick-tock, time for Bible class” do, too. The diaper pail has to be emptied.