Jason and his "Boomerang"

 

Jason and his Boomerang

            I seem to be constantly searching for new stories of faith and the triumph of the human spirit. I’ve read and heard many stories of true, unexplainable events in the lives of ordinary people that have had an extra-ordinary experience that defies logic. Some may call the things that happened coincidence but others will see the unseen hand of God behind the events. One true story that I will always remember happened to our son Jason.

            Several years ago we took Jason on vacation to the Smokey Mountains. We have been there several times over the years and the Smokey Mountains is his favorite place to visit. During one particular vacation Jason saw a boomerang while we were in the Cherokee Indian Reservation. Nothing would do him but that got that boomerang. As anyone who has ever been there can tell you, you’ll pay way more for an item than it is really worth. But Jason had his eye on this boomerang and that is all he wanted. He didn’t care if he got any other souvenir as long as he got that boomerang.

            If you’re on vacation and you’ve got a 10 or 12 year old son or daughter and they see something they set their heart on and it’s within your budget, what do you do? Right—you get it for them. Actually the boomerang wasn’t that expensive, but to Jason, it was like no other toy in the world!

            When we got back home, Jason played with that boomerang for days trying to get it to come back to him. I had to smile because I remembered back to when I was a boy. I also had a boomerang, but mine was home-made. Like Jason, I tried and tried to whirl that thing in the air and get it to come back to me—but it never would. I had tried until I was blue in the face but that blasted thing just wouldn’t come back to me—ha

            Of course you know, Daddies and Mommies are supposed to know how to do everything. Yeah—right. His mother, however, was quick to tell him she knew nothing about how to throw a boomerang. She told Jason he would have to get his Daddy to show him how. Thanks honey for the vote of confidence. I’ll repay the favor—ha.

            So, the job fell upon me to show our son how to throw a boomerang so it would come back. I made the excuse that if I threw the boomerang he couldn’t learn that way. He had to learn to throw it himself. It took some quick thinking to come up with that one—ha. I told Jason you had to throw the boomerang in the arc of a circle. You couldn’t just throw it straight; you had to hold your arm at an angle and throw it sideways. I knew the technique; I had read it in a book. Only problem was, I couldn’t do it.

            A few days later Jason was still trying to learn how to throw his boomerang when a gust of wind caught it and it soared over into the soybean field behind our house. He went to the spot where he thought it landed but the beans were high enough to hide it. He looked and looked and even had his mother and the kids in the neighborhood looking also. The search went on for several days with everyone looking. On what I believe was the third day, I walked out into the field early in the morning before I went to work. Dew was on the beans and my pant legs became all wet with the dew—but I found no boomerang. We were about ready to give up because in a few days the beans would be harvested and that would be the end of the boomerang—it would be broken by the combine.

            Just before I left for work, Jason woke up and asked me if I had found it. I replied that I didn’t. He then asked me, “Daddy, do you think I should look again?”

            I don’t know why I answered like I did but I said, “Yes, look one more time. Only this time throw your nets on the other side.”

            I then told Jason the story of how the disciples of Jesus had fished all night and never caught any fish. Jesus told them, ‘Cast your nets on the other side.’ When they did, they caught so many fish that it almost broke their nets.

            I left that day and started driving to work. When I got about half-way there, my cell phone began ringing. It was Jason.

            “Dad, guess what?” I could just hear the excitement in his voice.

            I answered, “You found your boomerang!”

            Jason answered, “I sure did!’

            I replied, “You threw your nets on the other side, didn’t you?”

            “I sure did!” He answered.

           

            What were the odds that a little boy with poor eyesight could ever find a small boomerang in a 40 acre soybean field? Coincidence? You've got to be kidding.

            I believe God sent Heaven’s GPS into the heart and the mind of a little boy who believed God could help him find it and a million acres of beans could have never kept that boomerang hidden.

            Jason still has that boomerang. It’s his secret weapon. Whenever there is any kind of trouble Jason will say, “Dad, I’ve still got my boomerang.”

            I will answer, “We don’t have anything to worry about then, do we?”