Hank Smith: 00:03 Welcome to followHIM Favorites. This is where John and I share a single story with each weeks Come, Follow Me lesson. John we’re in chapters 25 through 33 of Genesis. You have a story. Is it about Jacob and Esau?

John Bytheway: 00:16 It is. We’ve often heard he sold his birthright for a mess of potage. I didn’t know what that meant. I thought, is that like a pot of message? Uh, I guess so. It’s a bowl of beans. The whole idea was that one of these things is not like the other. It reminded me of a Music & the Spoken Word. I love the Tabernacle Choir Hank, the little messages they’ve given there. And I remember this one. This was amazing to me. A few years ago, executives at a large theme park hired consultants to help them understand how to capture the attention of small children. The consultants spent hours in a park observing children to see what most interested them. What they learned surprised them. The children seemed to be most captivated, not by the exciting rides, not by the costumed characters, not by the colorful displays, but instead by their parents’ cell phones.

  01:17 Especially when the parents were using them. And it made me laugh ’cause I thought of those Fisher-Price toys we make. Well, we’ll make it in full color. It’ll look like a cell phone, but we’ll make it in full color. Maybe that’ll help, right? Nope. I want the black one.

Hank Smith: 01:32 Nothing.

John Bytheway: 01:34 As one of the consultants reported, those kids clearly understood what held their parents’ attention and they wanted it too. Even small children got the message that cell phones were enticing action centers of their world, more interesting apparently than an amusement park. Worst of all, when parents were using their cell phones, they were not paying complete attention to their children. This story might prompt us to pause and consider what captures our attention. I thought of the mess of potage there, the message it sends. If I’m talking to you, Hank, but I’m also, wait, looking up my phone. Or if I put it on the table and I’ve had that weakness, I’m trying to be better.

Hank Smith: 02:22 Oh, me too. Worse than you, John.

John Bytheway: 02:25 No, I think you even did a talk about it. Wake up from your phone. It’s a good message because it sends a message. A mess of potage, right? If I’m more interested in my phone, I gotta put that away. When I’m with people that I care about, put it away.

Hank Smith: 02:42 I’ve often told youth and un-youth too, that there’s gonna come a day where you would give anything for 10 more minutes with that person and you’ve got your 10 minutes right in front of you. Why are you on your phone? There’s gonna come a day where, oh, you would just give anything to talk to that person again. It’s a good lesson, John. It’s a good lesson. Every time I pick up my phone and my son says to me, hey dad, and if I don’t put that phone away, I’m kind of trading my time with him for something kind of worthless. A mess of potage.

John Bytheway: 03:12 Yeah. Phone message or a message?

Hank Smith: 03:15 A phone message. I love it. Come join us on our full podcast. It’s called followHIM. You can get it wherever you get your podcast. We’re with Brother Mike Harris this week. He walks through these chapters in a wonderful way. He’s excited. He shows us some lessons that I’d never seen before. You’ll love him and then come back here next week. We’ll do another followHIM Favorites.