the devil made me do it

5:50am on a Saturday morning

8yr old son:  "Good Morning Mommy"
6yr old son:  "Good Morning Mommy"

Me - thinking - why is it you all always wake up too early on Saturdays and late on church and school days??
"Good Morning Boys, why are you awake so early??"

8yr old son:  "My devil brain told me to get up, sneak downstairs and play the Wii."
6yr old son:  "But our God brain told us to get dressed, come downstairs and ask permisson."

Me - thinking - the rest of this conversation should be interesting!

8yr old son:  "Sometimes I want to snatch out my devil brain and throw it on the floor and stomp on it!" as he is grabbing at his too long hair.

Me - thinking - these boys really need a haircut.
speaking to the 8yr old "Well the more you listen to your God brain the bigger your God brain gets and it takes up more room and squashes your devil brain out.  All you have to do is listen and follow God and God will take care of the rest!"

Both boys looking at me, sweet angelic faces and I of course say "I am sure God is very proud of you for listening to your God brain and doing the right thing even though it means you aren't playing on the Wii.  I think God would tell me to let you play so go have fun!"

Both boys "yeah!!!!" and scamper out of sight.

7:00am relating the story to my hubby as I get ready to leave for Annual Council.
Me - "I think they are getting it, so wonderful."
My Hubby - "they so know how to wrap their Mommy around their finger, they really love their Wii"  ;-)

I still choose to believe the boys "got it" for the morning, at least in that moment for that choice.  The encounter remdinded me of a story one of my spiritual mentors shared with my class on one of our retreats.  He told us about a native american story about the wolf within us - the wolf of Good and the wolf of Evil and every choice we made resulted in feeding the wolf of Good or the wolf of Evil.  Which wolf did we want to grow?  Which wolf would overcome us? 

My hope is to feed the wolf of Good so that Jesus might overcome me.  And the first thing I did when I got home from Annual Council was take the boys to get their haircut!