Life Lessons for Anxious Kids | Tree Street Kids DevotionalSample

Feeling as if your problems are bigger than a house

The house next door sagged as if it was just too tired to stand up anymore. A blue tarp covered part of the patched roof. The rain gutters somehow had dandelions growing in them. And the grass would have been past Jack’s ankles if he’d walked into the yard. For now, he ventured only as far as the narrow driveway that separated the rickety, old house from his own. 

Jack hoped a kid his age lived next door. He was missing the farm. He was missing his grandparents. He was missing his friends at his old school. Moving had made him angry and sad. He didn’t understand why God hadn’t answered his prayer to stay at the farmhouse.

Jack took a few steps up the driveway toward the open garage. It sagged almost as much as the house. He heard clanging and mumbling coming from inside. 

Please be a ten-year-old kid working on his bike, Jack thought. “Hello?”

“Hellooo?” A voice wavered from inside the dark garage. An elderly man in overalls and a white t-shirt shuffled out into the bright, summer sun. White wisps of hair tried to cover his mostly bald head. He held a dirty rag in one hand and a big hammer in the other. He shaded his eyes and eyed Jack. “What can I do you for?” 

“What?”

“What can I help you with? You selling them fundraising candy bars? ’Cuz, I’ll take ten. The ones with nuts, not them ones with raisins.”

“Um, I don’t have any candy bars,” Jack said. He jabbed his thumb over his shoulder in the direction of the house and added in his downest-in-the-dump voice, “I just moved.” 

But the man gave no evidence of feeling sorry for him. “Hmph, no candy bars then?”

Jack shook his head, suddenly wishing he had something to offer. “No, but I could help you out. You wouldn’t happen to be building a spaceship or anything cool like that, would you?”

The man laughed. “No, I’ve got another hole in my roof, and it’s already like Niagara Falls in the kitchen. Ever tried to make a tuna fish sandwich with soggy bread?”

Tuna didn’t sound good even on fresh bread. “No, sir, but I know how to patch a hole in the roof. I helped my dad and grandpa do stuff like that on our farm.”

As soon as he said it, Jack felt a little happier. Not about leaving the farm, but just because he knew he could help his neighbor.

Have you ever helped someone who was having a hard time? Maybe you listened to a friend who was sad. Maybe you mowed a sick neighbor’s grass. How did helping another person make you feel? Pretty good, right? When you put the concerns of others first, you don’t focus on your own problems as much. And you’re able to comfort them because of how much God has comforted you.

Words to hold on to when your problems seem bigger than everything else: “Our comfort abounds through Christ.”