Hold Me
“I wan’ you ta hol’ me!” My little student’s nasally words were hard to refuse. “We’re fixing to say the pledges, so I need to you stand up here by me, okay?” I whispered into his ear, my cheek brushing his smooth brown hair. Not even a minute passed before it came again: “I wan’ you ta hol’ me!” His big, brown eyes below distressed eyebrows made my heart melt. “I want to, too, but we can’t right now. We’re fixing to sing.” Briefly, in the bedlam that constitutes my church’s Awana song time, little Claude forgot his desire. But seconds later as I stood there facing the big screen, singing and clapping, he came to stand in front of me with the plea again. His desire was one I would have gladly granted had it not hindered his need to learn discipline, patience, and maturity--and mine to employ it. There’s a time and place for everything, but after I’d gotten home from church, I wondered if I had ever gotten around to holding him on my lap throughout our evening toge