My Little Drummer Boy

Edited: Here's the pictures!

My son is 4 years old, and absolutely LOVES the drums! We bought him his first drum, a plastic Little Tikes drum with plastic drumsticks that are attached to the sides of the drum so the child doesn't lose them, when he was 2 years old. Last year he decided he needed to have another drum because he wanted to have "real drumsticks...like Cliff!" Cliff is the man who plays the drums at church. My son has always watched Cliff very closely on Sundays and will imitate whatever Cliff does. His plastic drumsticks were just no good anymore because Cliff had wooden ones, so that's what my son had to have too. So this past Christmas, we bought him a little drum with wooden drumsticks.

He really started to imitate Cliff then! One Sunday during worship team rehearsal, Cliff threw one of his drumsticks. A few days later, our son threw his drumstick. Why? Because Cliff did it of course! A few weeks ago, one of the ladies who sings on the worship team with me said to me "You do realize you are eventually going to have to buy him a drum set don't you?" to which I replied "I know, but we just can't afford it right now." I had looked at a set at Christmas time, but we just didn't have that kind of money to spend on it.

This morning as I practiced with the worship team before church, I had to smile as I watched my son "drumming" as he intently watched Cliff. He held out his two index fingers and used them as drumsticks as he drummed in mid-air, and every so often he'd hit his daddy. At first I wasn't sure why he would hit his dad, but I quickly realized he hit him every time Cliff hit the cymbal (or "the cush" as our son calls it....I assume because that's what he thinks they sound like when they are hit so whenever he is drumming and he wants to pretend to hit a cymbal, he yells "CUSH!"). I teased my husband afterwards that I saw he was "the cush" while our son was drumming and he laughed while he shook his head in agreement.

We came home from church, grabbed some lunch, and then left to do some shopping. A few hours later we returned and after putting everything away, we went upstairs to start getting the kids ready for bed. My husband realized he forgot his electric screwdriver outside the night before so he quickly went downstairs to get it. We knew it hadn't rained last night so it should be ok, but we weren't sure it would still be there since we live in town and our backyard is not fully fenced in at the back so anyone can come into our yard if they really wanted to steal something they saw. Well my husband opened the back door and was surprised at what he found right outside the door on the top step: a dark blue (our son's favorite color!) drum set, complete with a little stool for him to sit on!

My husband brought the drum set in and put it in the living room. Then he called our son down because he knew he just couldn't allow him to go to bed before he saw this! Our daughter came down first and my husband was quick to tell her to "BE QUIET AND DON'T SAY ANYTHING!" because he knew she'd ruin the surprise for her brother. So, she put her hand over her mouth when she saw the drums, most likely in an effort to NOT say something! LOL! Our son comes down, takes one look at the drums, puts his hand over his mouth (like he sees his big sister doing), and then finally gasps "Oh my!". He then quickly grabbed his drumsticks that he had from the drum we bought him at Christmas and started pounding away. The smile on my little boy's face was just priceless. I don't have a digital camera, so you'll just have to wait until I get my film developed to see pictures. Sorry! LOL!

There was no note so we are not sure who left it there for him, but we have a few guesses who it might have been. I am trying to find out who left it because our son wants to thank the person! He didn't want to quit playing, but he made sure to tell me he was going to play his drums tomorrow as soon as he gets up....and I have no doubt at all that he'll be up bright and early and ready to hit those drums! LOL! As I headed back down the stairs after putting him to bed, the last thing I heard my little boy say was "I love my drum set mommy!".

We live just down the road from a fire station. When my daughter was 3 years old, she was terrified of the fire alarm because it is really loud. It always goes off at noon, so I told her that was just the lunch whistle so that one didn't scare her any more. When it would go off other times, I taught her to pray for the firemen and whoever needed help. She quickly learned to not be afraid and to this day she comes running to pray with me whenever the alarm sounds. My son learned to do the same because he saw what we did every time the alarm sounded. He decided to take it a step further though...he will pray whenever he sees a fire truck, police car, or an ambulance. He initially started to pray if he saw one of them with their sirens and/or flashing lights on, but then he started to pray for them even if they didn't have their lights and sirens on. He is very quick to pray for me if I say I'm not feeling good. He truly loves Jesus with all his heart.

Tonight as I sat here thinking about how thankful I am to the person(s) who thought of our son when they saw this drum set and brought if here for him, a verse came to mind. Psalm 37:4 says "Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart." As cute as I think it is that my son watches Cliff intently and does everything that he does, I want even more for him to look to Jesus and do what he knows God wants him to do. I just have to think that God wanted to bless our little 4 year old boy with a set of drums because He knows our son loves Him and He wanted him to have something that would make him happy. I feel so thankful and yes blessed because I know that it was a desire of MY heart for our son to have a drum set because I knew how much he would love it. Isn't it amazing that God loves us so much that He cares about the smallest details?!

In case the person who gave our son these drums is reading this: THANK YOU for allowing God to work through you and be a blessing to our family, especially our little boy! May the Lord bless you for your thoughtfulness!

To everyone else: Don't miss out on being a blessing to someone! Listen to that still, small voice that tells you to do something nice for someone. You may not think a phone call, letter, or even a gift may be much, but it may be exactly what that person needed at that time. How exciting to know that God sometimes uses US as an instrument to bless someone else! Be a blessing to someone today, and I know YOU in turn will be blessed as well!