A Conversation about Heaven with my Daughter.

Every night, before bedtime we do prayers with our daughter.

We kick it off with the classic, ‘Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep. And should I die before I wake. I pray the Lord my soul to take’. Then we go around the room and individually pray for who is on our mind, starting with Harper, then myself and finally my husband. Then, hugs and kisses and usually a quick request from Harper to lie with her for a few minutes. That night I volunteered and Tyler headed down the hallway to our room.

Usually, my daughter will ask me what my favorite part of the day was and she’ll share hers. And then in true five-year-old fashion, she’ll ask for my next favorite and my next favorite until I politely shut the conversation down with one more kid and a hug so she can fall asleep. That evening, however, Haper asked me a completely different question that would kick off a conversation that would leave me in tears.

‘Will there be soup in heaven’, she asked out of the blue.

‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘There will be lots of great food in Heaven’.

‘What about a table to eat at?’

‘Yes, there will be a great big table to eat whatever you’d like in Heaven’, I replied.

Questioning my answers, she replied, ‘Well how do you know that?’

Good question I thought to myself as I formulated a kid-friendly response detailing that God promises us eternal life if we follow him here on earth and that life in Heaven is even greater than we can imagine.

Satisfied with that answer, she replied, ‘So how old are you when you go to heaven?’

Woofda! Harper has always been a question box, but with each question the shock continued to heighten in my mind.

‘Well, age doesn’t really matter. It’s all up to God. Sometimes he takes young babies and children to heaven, and sometimes it’s older people.’

‘And sometimes, when people get sick it’s time to go to heaven?’ she added in question.

‘Yes! You’re right. Kind of like Great-Grandpa, right? He got sick and tired and God said it was time to go to Heaven.’

And her next train of thought completely rocked me.

‘How will God let me know when it’s my turn to go to Heaven?’

I fought back tears and complete shock as I tried to gather age-appropriate thoughts to respond. I shared with her that sometimes, we don’t know when it’s our time - accidents happen and it can be sudden. Other times, like with Great Grandpa, there are signs and some even feel God’s presence in letting them know that their time is coming. She seemed to be grasping what I was saying, while at the same time I could see her wheels continuing to spin in that sweet mind of hers.

‘So how do you hear God,’ she asked next.

I walked through that in life; she would experience many situations where she’d have to trust God.

‘He’ll send you signs or certain feelings to your gut, right here in your belly, to do this or maybe not to do that.’

‘So how do I talk to him?’

‘Great question. Like we’re doing now. Praying. Asking for help. Telling him something good happening in your day. It truthfully can feel a little funny at times when you’re starting out. It seems like you’re talking to yourself, but God is always listening and knows everything going on in your life. The bible tells us that God really appreciates when you talk with him. Seems silly, but it’s true.

She giggled. Then it was my turn to ask a question. ‘Do you have any more questions for me, Harper?’. She responded ‘no’ seeming satisfied with our conversation, yet I couldn’t help myself with one more question.

‘What made you think of all these great questions tonight?’

She responded quickly that she didn’t know and then quickly followed up by sharing that at church school a few weeks ago she talked about Jesus washing people’s feet. And that she got a yellow cross bracelet in true five-year-old fashion.

I smiled, took a deep breath and decided to wrap up our conversation, thanking her for talking with me about Heaven. We quickly talked about not worrying about going to Heaven because here on earth and up in Heaven, someone would always be taking care of her.

She nodded as she yawned and I took that as my queue to give one final hug and kiss before quietly shutting my daughter’s bedroom door.

I nearly ran into our bedroom down the hall to find my husband lying in bed. Still in shock, I quickly asked him if he heard Harper and I’s conversation through the monitor. Unfortunately, the volume was off, so he didn’t. I did my best to recap our conversation, trying not to cry, again.

While I like to think my husband and I do a decent job demonstrating various aspects of our faith during our daily lives, this conversation hit me with so much emotion.

Our sweet and spunky five-year old is asking questions that I don’t even know that I was considering in middle school, maybe even high school.

And while I may not ever know what prompted the questions, I’m so grateful to witness the Holy Spirit clearing moving through our daughter at such a young age.