May-June 1997
''Thanks, God, for Naked Fish''
I thank the Lord for the lesson he taught me about thanksgiving--that nothing is too funny for God to hear.
by Clem Boyd
When our son was 2, my wife, Julia, and I started teaching him how to pray. During that time, we did most of the praying, asking God to bless our sleep and to keep an eye on grandparents, family and friends from church.
We sought God's help for those who were ill, for patience to deal with job difficulties, endurance with seminary studies, open doors for evangelism and guidance about the future.
But when David got into the act, many new elements were introduced to our prayer life. First of all, David often directed the order of prayer.
"Go for it, Dad," he would tell me. Or he might interrupt, "Mommy's turn." If we hit "Amen" before the time he had in mind, he chipped in with "More times," his way of saying, "Let's keep going." We're still not sure if this was a sign of deep spiritual longing in his young soul or a way to stay up a little later.
The content of our prayers included a few surprises. David liked praying for his "Mama" and his "Papa," although his prayers often glued on a subject like maple syrup on his pajamas.
"Who do you want to thank God for, David?" Julia and I would ask.
"Paapa," he would say.
"And who else?"
"Paapa," once, twice and three times more.
During those first excursions into prayer, we thanked God for Pooh bears, Batman, Power Rangers, dinosaurs and numerous and assorted other creatures, real or imagined, that spirited across his mind in those last minutes before we said "Good night."
One night, as we were holding hands in his bedroom, David thanked God for something truly unique and then asked me to do the same. Before I knew it, partly out of routine, I was leaning over my son's bed, holding his hand and in total seriousness, saying, "Thank you, God, for naked fish."
When I heard myself saying the words, I stopped and admitted to my son, in the midst of an initial wave of chuckling, that I couldn't bring myself to pray for naked fish. Abruptly I fell to the floor, in an eruption of laughter. Tears sprang up in my eyes like a tidal wave, and laughter spilled from my lungs in great heaves. Julia stood near David's bedpost, laughing uncontrollably as well.
Thankfully, David did not take our outburst personally, but seemed to enjoy the small riot his request had started.
I regained composure and slowly hauled myself up from a flat-on-my-back position. I took hold of David's hand, looked at him, smiled and then, still chortling, said, "Amen."
I've thought about that prayer since then. I was knocked flat by what I viewed as the absurdity of my son's reason for thanksgiving.
Naked fish? Well, of course, they're naked, I tell myself, replaying the scene in my mind for a few belated guffaws. Envisioning a small-mouthed bass in a three-piece suit tosses me into another fit of giggles. Of course, David had clothed a rainbow trout pillow (how we got this item I won't explain) with one of his favorite T-shirts, so perhaps there was more significance in the idea of a naked fish for him than me.
What I've realized through all this is how free my son's prayer life really is, more free than mine. Though he's never heard the words, he is already living out Paul's command to thank God on all occasions (1 Thessalonians 5:18). Though this likely refers to the importance of thanking God even in the midst of trials, my son's prayer showed me there is always something to thank God for, even something my "sophisticated" adult mind may view as absurd.
God has pursued my arrogance on this point several times, and I have had to conclude that it is right and proper to thank God for the air I breathe, the slippers on my feet, the grass in the backyard, the bricks that hold up our house.
I thank God that David believes it completely correct to thank him for naked fish. And I thank the Lord for the lesson he taught me about thanksgiving, that nothing is too finny, I mean funny, for God to hear.
Clem Boyd is a freelance writer and co-leader of Xenos Christian Fellowship
in Dayton, Ohio. He and his family live in Beavercreek, Ohio.