NOW WHERE DID I LEAVE THAT KID?

After church can be so much fun! We all have that joyful feeling from the sermon and the music. We are with our brothers and sisters in Christ. It’s a nice time to say Hi and have a quick chat and a "Hey, let’s have coffee this week-I’ll call you!" We tended to spend a good fifteen or twenty minutes after church every Sunday quickly connecting with different people.

One Sunday we chatted and connected longer than usual-there seemed to a lot to catch up this time. Eventually people headed to their cars and finally it was just our family. And one other young man.

Caden was ten-a little older than our boys, but since they were the only kids left at church they had been playing together in the grass. “Hey Caden!” my husband called. “Where are your parents?” The boys stopped and Caden looked around. “I don’t know sir”, he said. We looked in the parking lot-only our car was there. Even the minister had gone home.

I was a little concerned-I didn’t have Caden’s parents’ phone number. I knew who they were, but we weren’t friendly enough to have exchanged phone numbers. My husband looked concerned too-Caden however didn’t have a care in the world. I glanced at my watch-it had been forty minutes since church let out. What kind of parents didn’t realize after forty minutes they are missing a child? This family only has four-I don’t think it would be that hard.

Suddenly a car screeched into the church parking lot and pulled up to us. It was Caden’s father. He quickly rolled down the window and said, “Hey guys-thanks for watching Caden. Hey buddy-get in the car!” Oh no-I wasn’t going to let him get away that easily.

I leaned down so I could see this father eye to eye and casually asked, “I’m just curious-how did you and your wife not realize Caden was missing?” My husband glared at me, but I really had to ask.

He looked at me with an embarrassed look and said, “Well, it’s my fault actually. We came in two cars this morning, and Allison had asked me to stop and get bread and milk at the grocery store on the way home while she took three of the kids home. She also asked me to take Caden with me to the store because he wanted to pick out some food for his lunch this week. But I forgot that part.”

It turns out after he got home from the store everyone realized they were missing a child. So Dad jumped back into the car and sped to the church. Which is how they didn’t even realize a child was missing. I had to laugh-I mean, I’d lost my kid four times by then. So I smiled and said, “You know, these things happen. I’m just glad everyone’s okay.” This poor father was not very anxious to get back home to his family at the moment, since he had called his understandably angry and worried wife to tell her Caden was fine. But a person’s got to face the music at some point, so father and son sped off.

Please comment and let me know your thoughts on this post. Have you ever thought to yourself “Now where did I leave that kid?”