“I Will Give Them My Toys” - Giving With A Child’s Heart

We made another donation trip to the Friendship House this weekend and it reminded me of the first time Paul took Gabriel earlier this year…….

God gave my eldest son a thoughtful, kind, empathetic heart.  My job as his parent is to encourage him with opportunities to show the Love of Christ and maybe discover a thing or two myself along the way.

Paul and I began looking for opportunities to serve with our children this year.  Typically I just set out our donation bags for pick up when we receive the little postcards from charities in the mail.  (Those who know me know how I feel about clutter so you can imagine how often I have bags ready for donation!)  But here was something we could do differently so that our eldest could actively participate in giving.  FBC Carrollton has something called the “Friendship House”.  They accept donations and people in need can go there and receive help.  At the beginning of the week we were going to encourage our eldest to go through his toys and consider putting some in the donation bag.  I had no idea what to expect because you know that for a three year old just SHARING is sometimes difficult.  And we were going to ask him to GIVE some toys away.  Honestly, I wasn’t anticipating more than a couple old, forgotten toys to be tentatively dropped into the bag for the first trip. 

The Monday morning before D-Day, (Donation Day), Gabriel was “helping” me vacuum with his toy vacuum.  I asked him to please put a certain toy in his closet.  He replied that there wasn’t any room in his closet because his closet was already full of toys.  I seized the opportunity to talk with him about giving and put my vacuum aside.  It wasn’t a longwinded or impressive speech because I know a three year old’s attention span is short.  After I introduced this giving opportunity to him, he hugged his vacuum and said, “I will give the boy my vacuum.  And my fire station.  And my new car.”  “Obviously he doesn’t get it,” I thought, “because he likes to use his vacuum, he likes to play with the fire station he just received for his birthday and he just got the new matchbox car this weekend!”  So I tried again, “Gabriel, when we give toys, it isn’t the same as sharing.  You and Daddy will take them to a special place at the church and leave them.  Then little boys will go with their mommy or daddy and they will get to take the toys home and play with them there.”   My son listened to me, nodded and headed to his room.  I followed and watched as he took some trains off of his train table, pulled out a handful of cars and trucks from his matchbox case and placed them on his bed.  Then he opened his closet and began to pull out more things.  I just stared and thought “How am I going to make him understand so that he doesn’t have a meltdown when they take the toys to the church and LEAVE them there??”  But at the same time I didn’t want to encourage him to only give toys he doesn’t play with anymore thereby putting in his head that he should give God his “leftovers”.  So I knelt down on the floor and tried again, “Gabriel, why are you giving your toys to other boys?”   Then my amazing, wonderful, precious first baby looked into my eyes and said, “Because the other boys are sad because they don’t have toys.  But I will give them my toys and they won’t be sad anymore.”  His empathy and selflessness left me speechless.  Before the tears could spill I gave him a hug and left the room.

It’s amazing my husband was able to decipher my watery words on the phone that morning as I told him what was taking place in our home at that moment.  Afterwards I went back into Gabriel’s room and asked him to set aside anything he wanted to give and explained that when Daddy got home they would go through it all and then put them in the bag.  In the end, Gabriel filled a large shopping bag with his toys. 

When Paul and Gabriel returned from church on D-Day, I saw a tearless, happy boy walk through the door.  My husband smiled and said everything went well.  I know my job as a parent is to teach my children, but sometimes children are a few steps ahead of their parents and it would be wise of us to learn from them.