God is younger than us.

Will you allow me to be honest? I’ve been sad lately. Not all-consuming or anything. But for the past few months now, I just keep finding myself at the end of a day disappointed and discouraged, asking, “Same thing all over again tomorrow?”

Maybe you can relate. I’ve just found myself in this period of life in which it feels like every day I’m doing the same thing. Another shower, another quiet time, another cup of coffee, another email, another worship set, another gas tank, another mow, another month’s budget, another diaper change, another game with the kids, another fight to break up, another teaching moment, another chapter, another tv episode. It’s like I’m just running on a hamster wheel—and I guess I will be until I die or get too old to keep it up?

Then there’s my kids. With the nice evening weather we’ve had lately, I’ve started taking my three daughters on these “reading walks” at bedtime. It’s exactly what it sounds like. After they’re all ready for bed, instead of reading on the couch, we go on a walk while I read to them. It’s been fun. I like it. Well, I like it …except for the stop at the neighbor’s magnolia tree. Each reading walk, they insist on stopping at the base of this tree to collect five leaves each (I had to set a limit, of course).

They love this part. It drives me crazy. They spend an inestimable amount of time carefully selecting which five leaves they want to carry along and eventually take home to show Mommy. They consider everything. The various sizes, textures, even the unique imperfections all play into the deliberation.

To my little girls, this ritual never gets old. How could it? In their eyes, each leaf is a masterpiece.

G. K. Chesterton has this big-time book called Orthodoxy. (If it makes you feel better, no, I haven’t read it either. But it’s one of those that smart people talk about all the time.) One famous portion I have read a few times says this:

Children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, “Do it again”; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we. The repetition in Nature may not be a mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical encore.

In Genesis 1, God takes a moment each day to celebrate the goodness of what he creates. Since then he has never stopped "upholding the universe by the word of his power” (Hebrews 1:3). Psalm 104:30 describes God rejoicing in the works of his hand. And of course Zephaniah 3:17 tells us God rejoices over his people with joyful singing.

During the most recent reading walk, I decided to let my kids teach me a lesson with the leaves. And, as the shift to summer approaches us, I want to pass it along to you:

Don’t grow-up so much. Allow yourself moments of childlike wonder. Don’t grow cynical or resentful toward life’s mundane repeats. In gratitude to God, savor his good, monotonous gifts. The warmth of another shower, the stillness of another quiet time, the rich smell of another coffee brewed or lawn mown, the provision and pleasures afforded in another month’s budget, the treasure of another person—even over an email or argument. And yes, another leaf on the ground.