A Family Affair

Cassie, meanwhile, is the long-suffering older sister. This was demonstrated perfectly when we were all trying to think up a good title for this book.

I suggested Heaven by Four.

Sonja suggested Heaven, According to Colton.

Cassie suggested He’s Back, but He’s No Angel.

—HEAVEN IS FOR REAL, 154

Sonja

We’ve been asked many times since Heaven Is for Real was published how we keep our family’s life “normal.” They want to know if Cassie and Colby are jealous of the attention heaped on Colton since his story has spread around the world.

We tell them that Colton may get most of the attention when we’re doing an interview or appearing at a speaking engagement somewhere, but when he’s home with his family, he gets treated just like his siblings. His big sister Cassie is a hawk about that.

Not that Cassie has ever shown any jealousy about the attention focused on Colton outside the family. But she keeps Todd and me on our toes when it comes to making sure her younger brothers are held to the same expectations and rules we set for her when she was their age.

Todd and I understand. We’re firstborn kids ourselves, and we know there’s a tendency to “baby the baby” in a family. We work hard to be consistent in our parenting so that all three kids are treated the same. We knew Cassie would be watching carefully when Colton turned ten to see if we instituted the kids-do-their-own-laundry rule. And we did. In a few years she’ll no doubt want to know that we enforce the same rules about dating and driving with the boys that we’ve established for her as she enters those years now.

In the Burpo household, there’s a set of rules for everyone, and we do our best to enforce them equally. Yes, Colton may get to miss a little more school than the other two due to speaking engagements, but we work our tails off to arrange things so that we can give extra attention to the other two kids, one on one, when we get back from a trip.

When we’re on the road as a family, it may be Colton who’s onstage speaking and singing “Amazing Grace,” but everyone has a job. Colby gets to come onstage and show audiences “this is what Colton looked like when he visited heaven.” Then he works at his other job: handing out Heaven Is for Real bracelets.

Cassie’s job is one she asked for. Like most public speakers, we have a merchandise table where our books are sold when we’re speaking somewhere. Cassie was interested in that and enjoyed working at the table. In fact, now she runs the table when she travels with us. It’s a big job for a fifteen-year-old, but she handles it like a pro.

One way I spend special time with my kids is to volunteer to be a class sponsor or to help chaperone school trips. Recently I spent four days accompanying Cassie and twenty-two other students to the state conference of the Future Business Leaders of America in Lincoln.

It meant a lot to Cassie that I took time off work and made that trip with her. How do I know? She told me so, both before and after the trip—even though she also told me she didn’t want to ride in my car for the trip to Lincoln. It turned out that the sophomores were assigned to me, so she rode in the Burpo bus anyway, and it all turned out fine.

I loved seeing Cassie interact with her friends, and was proud of her for handling the pressure of competition so coolly. She didn’t place in any of her events, and she was gracious about losing—which made me just as proud of her as if she had won.

I had just returned from a speaking trip to Florida the day before we left for the FBLA trip, and I had to rearrange my work schedule at the real estate office where I work. Cassie recognized what I had done so that I could go with her and her classmates on the trip. So when it was over and she told me, “Thanks, Mom,” I knew she really meant it.

I like being with our kids and their friends, and I try to be fun to be with. Cassie told me she was glad I went with them. She said the other chaperones were “calm and nice.”

I said, “So I’m the crazy one?”

She said, “Yeah, basically.”

We encourage our kids to invite their friends to our house to hang out or to spend the night. I won’t deny that it’s a great way to be a fly on the wall and find out what’s on their minds and what’s going on in their lives.

Todd and I are like most parents we know: we’re doing the best we can to give our kids a solid foundation of love and direction while sharing our faith with them.

Todd

Every time I come into my office, I see a reminder that helps me keep in focus my responsibilities as a parent and pastor. Written in pencil in careful fifth-grader handwriting, it’s a framed, essay Cassie wrote when she was ten years old. Here’s what it says, misspelling and all:

My dad is my hero.

by Cassie Burpo

My dad, Todd Burpo, is my hero. He is a firefighter, pastor, and more. My dad is willing to help, caring about others, and a great person. My dad is there when I need help and when others need help too. He loves to help a lot.

My dad, being a firefighter, can be called anytime about a fire. My dad is a volunteer, so he doesn’t get payed at all. He will go into a fire, risk his life, to save a person or animal in the fire. My dad and the other firefighters will put out a fire when needed. I am scared when my dad goes to a fire. He always has come back.

My dad is a pastor. He preaches about every Saturday night and Sunday morning. My dad talks about the right things all the time to people. When there is something needed done at the church he’ll do it. He is dedicated at being a pastor.

It’s true that Cassie, the big sister, is still making sure the house rules she grew up with are consistently enforced today for her two brothers. But her essay reminds me that she and her brothers—and a lot of other people too—are watching me and counting on me. And it provides as a daily reminder that even though she’s about to turn sixteen, she still needs a hero. And that hero needs to be her dad.

So every day, amid all the other things I do and duties I fulfill, I want to make sure I can answer yes to the questions I ask myself:

Does Cassie know I still love her? Do I still make time for her? Set the right example for her? Can she look at me and be proud? And one day will she look for a man who might have some of the same qualities as her hero-dad to be her husband?

Even though I may be on the road, traveling a lot with Colton these days, as I write this I’m getting ready to pick up our jet skis from the shop and looking forward to the weekend when I can spend some time zipping around the lake with my daughter.

From the outside looking in, people seeing our family might assume Colton gets all the attention. But that’s just not true.

The real truth is, all three of our kids are constantly watching Sonja and me for reassurance that we’re parenting all of them consistently and also to see that we’re being consistent in the way we live our lives, both inside our home and out in the world.

Cassie’s essay is my daily reminder of that. When I walk into my office and see it there in its frame, I ask God to help me be to Cassie and her brothers the kind of godly dad he is to me—and to be the hero to Cassie that she thinks I am.

One of the biggest principles of healthy parenting is consistency. Would your household pass a consistency check-up? If you need to make improvements, God will help.

Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it.

—Proverbs 22:6