Day 4: Face to Face

I teach Rhetoric 2 to sophomores at Logos School here in Moscow, Idaho, and every year around this time, I assign the (now famous) Journal Project. The Journal Project consists of 30 days of journal entries on the same topic. The students are given one day off each week, so we complete the Journal Project over the course of five weeks (writing six days each week). Only this year my students asked me to do the Journal Project with them. So here we go… My topic is my family.

Day 4

My son sits in his high chair looking from face to face, studying features, taking in the eyebrows and expressions. He has no words of his own yet, but he already reads faces. His own eyes open wide or squint to a grin. His face understands our faces. His face mimics our faces, but he’s also reading, learning, responding.

His siblings love to make him laugh. They laugh at him; he laughs back. His chin tilts back and he smiles at the sky and a baby laugh shakes his body. Again and again. It never gets old.

My wife points out that sometimes a new face enters the room or a new situation arises, and frequently his first response is to look at one of us. He’s watching our faces to see what it means; he’s watching to see how we respond. If we smile or nod, he smiles and goes with it. Sometimes a bit of hesitation or concern on our face can translate to the same on his. He’s speechless, and yet he’s already learning how to face the world, how to respond to life.

Moses was God’s friend. He talked with Him face to face, and even though Israel couldn’t handle that glory, Moses wore the fading light on his face for them, showing them a face they couldn’t remember, a face forgotten, a new face for them to learn.

My son is in the process of putting on his face, learning his part, and our prayer is that the face of his Father is shining through to his.