By Danny Minton
Around midnight one evening, I rose from my chair and began shutting the house down for the night. It is in those late nights, or should I say early hours of the day, that memories of things past tend to creep through our minds. On this night, I had thoughts of our son Scottie, who was born with Athetoid Cerebral Palsy.
Each evening, as I would get ready for bed, one of the last things I would do would be to go to his room to check on him and turn on his DVD of “Land Before Time.” It was one that allowed us to play the audio without the TV turned on, and it automatically stopped when it was finished. I would then go over to his bed, kiss him on the forehead, and tell, “Good night, Scott Boy; see you in the morning.”
We had a computer set up with a camera in his bedroom to check on him during the night without having to walk across the house. Many nights, he would stay up late, and we’d hear him laugh out loud. We figured that there were angels who came to play with him in the night hours when he couldn’t go to sleep. He loved to laugh, whether it was the DVD, Angels, or something else.
Scottie laughed a lot. We could watch a movie, and someone would open a squeaking gate, and he would cackle out loud. If a baby laughed, he’d join in, sometimes laughing so hard it almost made him cry. Most of all, he laughed at witches and ghosts and goblins. To him, they were funny, making funny noises. A cackling witch on a broom would set him off. He laughed at the shower scene in “Psycho.” He laughed at the scene in “Steel Magnolias” when Shelby is in a coma, and her mother yells, “Open your eyes, Shelby. Open your eyes!” He laughed at Titanic when Rose was wading through the water, calling our “Jack, Jack!” He laughed at “Star Trek” when Captain Kirk called out, “Scotty! Scotty!” He laughed at Yogi Bear when he heard, “Hey, Hey! Boo, Boo!”
He was not afraid of movies that many find scary. He was not saddened by people in a panic. He laughed when people were happy. He had a certain peace about him, the same peace of the spirit God wants to instill within each of us. He wasn’t anxious unless a doctor or nurse was treating him, and maybe at times when he was getting a bath!
It made me stop and think that how he felt things was the picture that Jesus was trying to give us when he told us not to worry or be anxious but to put our cares and troubles in his hands. Scottie somehow knew the movies would not harm him, so he just laughed along. Somehow, he felt the joy of those around him without understanding the complete picture.
In our lives, we find ourselves too many times caught up in events of life that burden our hearts with anxiety and worry. We let things bother us that we shouldn’t and even fail to see the good happening around us. We don’t notice the squeak of the gate because we are too busy looking ahead at what might happen next.
I read the story once of a man walking across the parking lot and finding a dime as a child. He decided that there must be more money on the ground, so everywhere he went, he looked for lost coins on the ground. As he approached the later years of life, he had found over $100 in loose change here and there. In his possession were 641 pennies, 195 nickels, 311 dimes, 180 quarters, 18 half dollars, 30 one-dollar bills, and one crumpled five-dollar bill. But in the end, he had missed countless sunsets and sunrises. He failed to see the rainbows that followed the storm, the butterflies that invaded spring, and the fire-colored leaves of autumn. He had missed the beauties of life, always looking down.
We should each take the time to look at the good in the world. We should enjoy the peace that Jesus can give us when we turn our troubles over to Him. We should laugh with the joys of others. We should learn not to be afraid of those things that really can’t hurt us. We should learn not to feel burdened.
I miss the nighttime rituals with both of our boys. I miss the laughs at night. There is one thing that Scottie’s late nights have taught me. Most of all, we should all learn to play with the angels in the peace of the night.

“For I am the LORD your God who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, ‘Do not fear; I will help you.’” Isaiah 41:13

Danny Minton is a former Elder and minister at Southern Hills Church of Christ