The only way to make summer last…
{After being away for five days, we were barely through our back gate when the kids broke into a run, straight across the yard to the far side … straight to the raspberry bushes. I grinned, leaving all the bags behind to join them plucking perfectly pink berries, savoring the sweetness, hunting after another, another, another. I had been away from them, and from home, and had been blessedly surrounded with incredible people who taught me once again to be present, to soak up life and love and give others the gift of me all here. And I remembered this from a few years ago: The gift of the raspberries, the gift of summer, the gift of soaking up the sacredness of now.}
It was the raspberries that helped me understand.
The raspberries I rescued. This spring, I took on the back-breaking project of tearing out waist-high weeds from our side-yard. And there I unearthed raspberry bushes (raspberries!) and you’d have thought I’d struck gold by the way I happy-danced. I carefully plucked the weeds around them, and Dad and I strung them up, training the canes.
Then we waited.
And almost as if in response, as their own way of saying thank you!, they handed us their treasures in return. Large, plump, dark pinkish-red, firm in your fingers as you pluck them off the hull and plop them into your mouth. None of them have made it inside the house. (This is new for me.) I’ve never frozen one or turned it into jam. I’ve never eating one sitting down, only standing, savoring, their sweetness bursting and urging you on to search for more. No matter how many times you think you found the last one, you can always find one more, perfectly ripe and hiding behind a leaf. As I stood doing the dinner dishes last night I watched the kids picking their dessert, searching under branches and crawling around for just one more.
Pluck, eat. Pluck, eat. Pluck, eat. None of theirs made it into the house either.
See: I’ve always thought the way to make summer last was by harvesting LOTS and saving it up for winter. If you know me a little bit, you know I am a freeze-er. We aim for 50 lbs. of strawberries, 100 of peaches, 50 of blueberries, and whatever else we can stuff in our back-porch freezer. All winter long our grocery budget rests easy and our immune system smiles as we blend our fruit smoothies every day. And while I’ll continue to do this, the question must be asked:
Is summer preserved by simply freezing fruit?
Can a season be lengthened by canning up its produce?
Is the the joy of summer a commodity, able to be packaged up and opened later on?
I guess the question is really more like this, How do we get the most out of a day? Out of a season? How do we really make summer last?
And while I will still enjoy sliding dozens of fruit-packed ziplocks into my freezer, I think the real answer is this:
We make summer last by diving deep into every moment.
By eating raspberries standing up.
By saying, Yes! I’ll run up and down the side-walk one more time, holding the back of your bike while you lean and totter and fall and try again. I’ll run up and down, my thighs burning and I covered in sweat. And after awhile I won’t even notice because I’m watching your face and it’s light and your eyes are dancing and mouth wide-open laughing, shouting “I’m doing it Mommy! I’m really doing it!”
By saying, Yes! Let’s plant these seeds and Ooops, you dropped them all on the ground, but that’s ok let’s laugh and pick them up and poke them down deep into soil. And you let the dark dirt under your fingernails and you brush your hands off on your jeans and finish with ice-cold lemonade, and every day you watch for those little green shoots. And you watch her as she watches. You study her face. Her lashes, curls, lips. You go slow enough to memorize the moment–her looking for life and you finding it.
By saying, Yes! I’ll run through the sprinkler with you although I’d rather read my book, because your laugh is liquid, and you screaming, splashing, jumping is better than anything on any page. And how many days do I have to do this? Yes, let’s do it again.
Because I am a hopeless plan-ahead-er, and my brain works only in future-tense, and I’m counting down the days of strawberry season and trying to plan enough picking days and I want to harvest all I can from those fields …
but more than that I want to harvest all I can from these days.
This life. These long days in these short years. (These little years will be gone five minutes from now.)
And so today, on the first day of summer, I adjust my goal from “storing up” to “entering in,” from “saving” to “savoring.”
From reading so many pages to reading just a few faces.
My summer resolution: I will eat more fruit standing up.
{Happy summer! Let’s make it last … Thanks for reading.}
Where you tend a rose …
Where you tend a rose, a thistle cannot grow.
-Frances Hodgson Burnett, Secret Garden
The yard surrounding our 109-year-old house reminds me of the secret garden: each summer I find something new hidden beneath tangles of weeds or overgrown grass.
The first year, in the midst of waist-high weeds I found raspberries, gooseberry, and blueberry bushes (hooray!). A week of back-breaking weeding was worth it–we now enjoy sweetness by the handful. Last year, I discovered dahlias and a stone-border deep beneath layers of dirt and grass along the house. Long ago, someone must have carefully placed each of those stones and planted the flowers, but over the years neglect crept in and crowded it out. I dug out the dirt and uncovered the stones, clearing out the weeds so the dahlias could live. The first bright-red one just spread wide this week and showed its vibrant face.
Each year my yard-work reminds me: There is already something lovely underneath, I just need to clear away all the ugliness to find that hidden beauty. My kids, my heart, my life, when neglected, become a tangled mess. The heart-weeding of discipline clears out the junk so virtue can thrive.
But this year, I tackled a particularly pitiful space: A (dead) honeysuckle plant withered away on a large (ugly) archway, in front of a stretch of weeds and waist-high concrete where the dryer vent in the basement spits lint onto the dirt beneath. This time, there was nothing lovely to unearth. No rock border. No plants. Just dirt and weeds, lots of weeds.
So, I weeded. Weeded and weeded and weeded, trying to keep that (ugly) space free of weeds.
Then, it dawned on me: The key to this space isn’t to pull, it’s to plant.
Sometimes my parenting–and living–is lopsided. I discipline. Them and me. Pull those weeds of selfishness and laziness and disobedience. Weed, weed, weed. Pull those weeds. Consequences, consequences, consequences.
Perhaps though, we might have better results, if we weeded less and planted more?
The Secret Garden lines ran through my mind:
Where you tend a rose, a thistle cannot grow.
Discipline is indeed important, but even more so is training. A wise woman’s words came back to me again. Her six kids all growing up and following Jesus. She’d said it so simply:
“Discipline less, train more.”
Discipline is important, of course. Negative behavior brings negative consequences. But training is preemptive, if we’re diligent to train, much of that discipline doesn’t even need to happen!
Training is planting. Discipline is weeding. So often I feel like I spend my days running around weeding, constantly weeding. Oops there’s another weed! What if I planned ahead a teeny bit more, and planted. Planted seeds of training in my kids, little by little, every single day. Although it takes investment, and it’s still back-breaking work, and it still means getting your hands dirty, I’ll tell you:
Planting is a whole lot more fun than weeding.
Resolved: Weed less, plant more.
{May you plant joy, kindness, and love this week. Thanks for reading.}
Heidi’s Gold Shoes
Her first pair came Christmas 2010: gold sparkling metallic ballet slippers. She was not yet 2, but they quickly became her prized possession. She wore them every day and even to bed at night until they literally fell apart. Heidi has another pair now, and yesterday I noticed they too have achieved the well-worn beauty of that first precious pair. It reminded me of this:
“Yesterday, I pulled the gold shoes out of the laundry, damp and smashed flat, and I shaped them and propped them, as I always do, on top of the heating vent to await their next wear. But as I held them, fingering the worn toe, no longer gold but worn brownish black, the soles thin as socks from frequent use, I thought of how beautiful they were just like that.
Worn out.
Beautiful because my beloved girl has worn the life out of those shoes. She has delighted in them. From the moment her not-yet-two-year-old eyes beheld them they were her favorite pair. Worn to bed, to church, to play. In the mud and in the sand, on the sidewalk and on the carpet. Even in her bed.
She wore them out with love.
And I thought of something my pastor said a few months ago, when he attended the funeral of his 100-year-old grandmother. He stood above her lifeless shell and said,
“She wore that body out.”
She used it up, he said. She used up every ounce of her strength and energy, every earthly breath, in loving and serving, ministering and sharing, spreading the message, joy, and hope of our Risen Lord.
She used that body up.
And that reminded me of a funny quirk of mine that just then began to make sense. I love using things up. I don’t know why it gives this odd thrill, but I do. I love using that last drop of milk and tossing the carton, or squeezing out the last bit of toothpaste, squeezing that tube with all I have, or scraping the last bit of peanut butter out of the jar.
I love using things up.
To me, the sight of an empty jar, a worn-out gold slipper, even a lifeless shell of a faithful saint–these things are beautiful.
Because they gave it their all. They were used to the full.
There’s profound beauty in emptiness when it means it was used-up well.
All spent.
And isn’t that the goal of our life? Isn’t it to spend every ounce of our being, to get all used up for the glory of God, storing up treasures in heaven that one day we can enter into that which is truly life, and say,
Yes. It was worth it.
Worth getting holes in the toe. Worth thin soles. Worth getting tired.
Worth wearing out.
May we enter heaven’s gates in glorious exhaustion and hear, just maybe hear, the sweetest words we’ll ever know,
“Well done, good and faithful servant …
enter in to the joy of your master.”
Then maybe cast a crown and join all creation in praise to His name.
Maybe trade in those worn gold slippers to walk barefoot …
… on streets of gold.”
{May we wear out for Jesus’ sake. Have a blessed week! Thanks for reading.}
On baking bread and slow days
On slow days I bake bread.
Sometimes three loaves, if I know the pace is about to pick up or the afternoons are about to get hot. I only use my oven on cool, slow days.
Wednesday was my slow day. The last cool day on the forecast, the kids were happy to be home, and when I returned from exercise they were nowhere to be seen–lost in imagination, hidden in large cardboard boxes turned to transmogifiers and time-machines and secret hide-outs and space ships. There are 12 of these giant boxes currently on my back porch: I long ago gave up on strict tidiness. My kids’ creative inventions aren’t always cute, in fact, most often they’re eye-sores.
But I figure I have decades ahead for a tidy, cute house.
No doubt then I’ll ache with missing these cardboard-box days.
So I let them make believe, and I make bread.
My mom was a bread baker. A legendary one. A paleo-dieter would not have lasted long in her kitchen. Her crescent rolls–buttery, perfectly-puffed-up, slightly golden brown on top–were a staple at every holiday. She taught me how to feel the dough, the right warmth and elasticity. She taught me how to knead with quarter turns, sweeping flour slightly underneath, pushing the heels of my hands down and pulling up gently with my fingers to pull the dough over on itself–rhythmic. She showed me perfect bread isn’t as much science as art, and her recipes included lines like, “Add flour until the dough feels right.”
At lunch time, I call the littles and slice a loaf into sandwiches, heavily-loaded with chicken-salad. Their eyes light up: It’s their favorite lunch. We sit on the steps of the back-porch, surrounded by boxes, and silently savor our simple feast.
Later, while I’m wiping up crumbs, Dutch calls: “Mommy, will you come sit with me?” He’s on the front porch, perched on the wooden railing, feet dangling over the edge, above the flowers far below. I join him, carefully perched on the railing, my legs dangling beside his.
He is my nature-boy. He once remarked that the ocean was his best friend. Today he points out colors–the purple japanese maple, the light-green new-growth, the dark cedar branches, the “sunset orange” (his words) zinnias and white-magenta striped pansies. He thinks the pansies look like purple tigers.
“I’m so happy, mommy. This is my favorite thing. If only people could just be happy with what they have, the trees and flowers and bugs. Then we wouldn’t have so many problems.”
I smile at his philosophizing.
We stay there, on the porch, dangling legs, and I think of kneading dough: Think of how often parenting baffles me, until I slow down and put my hands on it and feel–then I know when it’s right. I think of gently forming loaves and lives and letting them rise slowly, on their own. I think of watching and waiting to see these rounds turn golden, almost ready.
So often I think I need a trip to the store and a parenting book.
More often I need a slow day to bake bread and dangle legs.
{Here’s to slow days. Happy Weekend! Thanks for reading.}
Polish the Silver {How to get it right}
I woke up early that morning (it was my birthday) and sneaked downstairs.
I was turning six and so excited for my tea party that day. Mom was still sleeping; she had been working hard to prepare for my party, and I wanted to do something special to help her. I looked up onto the high counter and saw the antique sterling silver tea set. That was it! I knew that one of the things she needed to do that morning was polish the silver–I could surprise her and do it for her! Yes, that was the perfect idea.
Now, Where’s the polish?
I vaguely remembered there being polish in the laundry room, so I dug around a little until I found it. It was thick and white, and oozed out of a special spongy tip on one end.
I set to work with all my heart. Rubbing carefully, I covered every surface of the sterling silver set. It was very white and very pasty. Hmm… It definitely looked different from what I’d imagined, but I was glad that I’d finished the job completely before mom woke up.
Just then she came in.
“Oh my!” she said. Her eyes were so big. (She was so surprised!) She smiled wide, really really wide, as she looked at the silver and at me.
“I polished the silver for you Mommy!” She looked at me with so much love in her eyes and this huge smile, I could tell she was so incredibly blessed by my hard work for her.
“Thank you,” she said, and meant it. “Thank you so much. Can I take a picture of you there with the silver?”
I beamed, and sat beside the white chalky silver for a photo.
Then she came next to me: “Now, shall we make it a little less white? We can work on it together.” Together we did a little more work, rinsing off all the white stuff, and wiping the silver clean. Then, still smiling, she pulled out another container from a tall shelf in the kitchen.
“This is the silver polish. Let’s use this one on the silver; ok? We can do it together.” I beamed, still so happy because she was so happy. I knew she was pleased.
It wasn’t until much later that I understood what all took place, when I looked back at the photo in an album and saw the caption:
“Kari loves to help. She polished the silver for me with shoe polish. :)”
Shoe polish.
Here’s what I love: When I think back on that memory, there is only joy. Sure, in a very real sense I did it wrong. I polished silver with shoe polish. But I don’t remember any shame. No anger, or irritation, or annoyance. I wasn’t belittled.
My mom saw my heart, and in my heart: I got it right.
Last week was a busy one for me, and one morning I came downstairs and discovered that Heidi had wanted to bless me. So she was unloading the dishwasher. She was doing the utensils, but since the counters are so high she was sorting out all the clean silverware … on the floor.
“Mommy! I’m helping you!” She beamed.
“Oh!”I smiled, a wide, wide smile. “Thank you. Thank you so much,” I said, and meant it. And while she wasn’t looking (she’s a photo-phobe), I snapped a pic because someday I want her to know that even when she got it wrong, her mama knew she got it right.
Oh friend, how often I have feared stepping out in faith to serve my God, because I was so afraid I wouldn’t get it right? How often I have feared the failure, or the looking foolish. But there is so much grace and freedom in the Kingdom. Our Father sees our hearts, when we earnestly and honestly work to love and serve Him from a heart of humble childlike faith.
Even when we get it wrong, He sees we got it right.
{May this freedom rule your hearts this week. Polish the silver! With love…thanks for reading.}
PS Happy Mother’s Day, Mom. Thank you.
The best finishing feeling
So this was the day math took three hours and twenty-three minutes. This was the day I thought to myself, “Today is NOT the day to write a homeschooling post.” This was the day I wondered, “Why exactly am I homeschooling? Why am I so enthusiastic about this education option?”
But then, turns out it was the day to write a post, and it reminded me all over again why we’re doing this thing called homeschooling and why, yes, I remain enthusiastic about this education option.
Because of that best finishing feeling.
I’ve shared a bit in the past about my challenges with my precious son, who’s 8. He’s special. *smile* He’s brilliant. And difficult. Some days we’re firing on all cylinders, and we breeze through the books. Then there are other days.
Oh, those other days.
This was one of those.
But here is why it was different: {Read the rest over at Simple Homeschool… Thanks!}
What to do when the novelty wears off…
It’s 82-degrees as I sit here on my front porch, slowly clicking out thoughts while the neighbor mows his lawn. Fat bumblebees, drunk on nectar, lazily move from flower to flower on the rhododendron to my right. I watch them for a moment then stretch my fingers out–my fingernails are still brown with dirt. We just planted the garden.
This year marks my most lackluster gardening effort. My ag-enthusiasm has waned significantly this year, and I probably would have skipped the whole thing, honestly, except our dear housemate bought seeds and brought them home all bright-eyed and eager. We saw the 80-degree forecast and planned a house-wide gardening day. I couldn’t skip it.
With the sprinkler on full-blast and shrieking kids splashing and dashing around the yard, we pulled weeds, poured topsoil, and pushed dozens of tiny promises into the ground. I’m always reminded that burying and planting are exactly the same in that moment.
Then we finished. We watered. Now … we wait.
And I sat down here, on my porch, to study Scripture, searching for a solution for my sluggishness. I had said to Jeff this morning,
“I feel sluggish. It’s hard to just keep doing the same thing, over and over and over. Especially when you don’t see a lot of change.”
He spoke life over me, as always, reminding me that new things, novelty, energizes us. So we seek after new things, after novelty.
But eventually the novelty wears off … and that’s where faithfulness begins.
[bctt tweet=”Faithfulness begins where novelty ends.”]
In all areas of my life, the novelty has worn off. I’ve been married for 12 years, parenting for 8 years, speaking for 7 years, working on my book for 4 years and church-planting for almost 3 years. Though I LOVE all those things, there are certainly days I feel the lack-of-novelty most keenly. The temptation is to try something new–not a new husband, of course–but maybe new clothes, or a new vacation, or a new … anything.
But the truth is, I don’t need something new. I need to be renewed. I need God to renew my heart and mind and spirit in His presence, by His Word and with His people, to keep me persevering in the faith. So I immerse myself back in His Word and see this:
“For God is not so unjust to overlook your work and the love that you showed for his sake in serving the saints, as you still do. And we desire each one of you to show the same earnestness to have the full assurance of hope until the end, so that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.” Hebrews 6:10-12
When the planting was done and the waiting began, she pulled up. That same friend who woke me up that day, that same friend who models mundane faithfulness every day. That same friend married to a farmer with 5 kids aged 7 and under.
You think she knows about the novelty wearing off?
And she always carries life with her and hugs me, and she only has a moment to spare but she gives me that and it’s all I need.
And I’m reminded again it is His presence and His people who most powerfully renew my spirit when I am struggling with sluggishness again. It is not a new something that I need. It is the old–the old truths and the old friends who come along and point me to the promise and say:
“Remember? That’s where we’re going. Keep at it. We’ll reap a harvest if we don’t lose heart.”
And so I do. I become, once again, an imitator of those who continue in faith and patience.
I will plant. I will water. I will wait.
I will hope.
{Thanks for reading.}
As you lead your chicks through danger today…
We were sitting outside Starbucks when we saw them–right there in the busy parking lot of a shopping center: A mama duck and her 12 teeny ducklings. Oh! So precious. I crept near to take a picture so I could show my daughter, who adores any baby fowl.
I sat back down, but a moment later that feathered mama had me on my feet again.
She proceeded to begin crossing the highway. This is an extremely busy intersection with SIX lanes of traffic, mind you. But boldly she stepped down off the sidewalk into the first lane, her brood of unquestioning babes trailing along behind her. Oh no! I almost couldn’t watch. They were so incredibly tiny and helpless, their little downy heads (no helmets!) and soft cheep cheep chirping (no voices!). And somehow the fact that they don’t have arms seemed to make them all the more vulnerable (as if, at 4-inches tall, they could hold up an arm and effectively stop traffic).
But there they went, without voices or arms (or helmets!) and weighing a few ounces at most, they bravely followed that mama onto the asphalt, 1-ton trucks barreling by, oblivious drivers speeding through yellow lights, everyone in a hurry.
But this mama duck wasn’t in a hurry. She was the picture of confidence as she navigated around one stopped car (that had, thankfully, seen them coming) and paused, perhaps to consider her route. The little chicks paused, huddled in close to mama, waiting patiently for her next move.
Across she went.
Just when I thought I couldn’t stand it anymore, and was about to do the crazy-lady thing and go run out onto the highway and try to stop traffic, a man mercifully stopped his car to block several lanes, clicked his flashers, hopped out, and began flagging down cars to clear the way.
A crowd had gathered by now, watching this fearless mama lead her chicks safely home.
See, on the other side of that dangerous intersection, down the grassy knoll, is the river. The beautiful, serene, glorious river. Where ducks belong. I don’t know exactly how she ended up in the parking lot, but I do know that she knew where she had to go and was brave enough to take her littles there.
And she made it. I’m not even an animal-lover, but I have to admit a little water in my eyes as I finally saw the whole family safely on the other side.
Probably because I recognize that journey. I’m on it. You probably are too.
This world is nuts. Absolutely nuts. Between pesticides, pedophiles, and ISIS we have enough to make us stark raving mad with fear.
This world is not our home.
There is a home, and we lead our children through many dangers, toils, and snares, to follow Christ through this life, without fear, and trust Him to lead us safely home. We train them to follow us, we teach them to be brave, we warn them of the dangers but we still must go on. And the man Jesus Christ gives His life to stand in traffic, protect us from evil, and lead us safely through to the other side.
Let’s not fear. Let’s be brave mamas (and dadas and grandparents!) and lead our littles through the danger with faith.
A glorious home awaits us on the other side.
Happy Friday! Have a blessed weekend, and thanks for reading.}
Mommy Fails: What our days are really like
Just for fun, I asked y’all to share with me some of your favorite “fail” moments as a mom. Some sweet gals gathered last night to talk about how we measure our worth as women, and so often it’s based on our performance as moms. So, I just thought it’d be refreshing to see a glimpse of what our days are really like, as moms. I didn’t have space to include them all, but here are a few, kept anonymous. 😉 Enjoy!
There was the time we loaded all the kids in the car for the ride to church and I kept feeling like I was forgetting something. It was baby number 4 who was sleeping in the bassinet inside the house.
i let them have brownies for breakfast, skip homeschooling, play in the mud, stay outside in the dark to play in the rain…one in just a diaper…..all just today.
I used a wipe to clean my child up before the Dr appointment when I realized he hadn’t bathed in a week and might smell….there was no clean underwear either!
I bribe my older 2 with cash to play with the 2 yr old so I can get a break. Or dumping the poop out of a diaper then putting it back on and using paper towels as wipes while shopping,because I forgot to bring diapers and wipes.
I once bribed my kids into an early bed time with the promise of chocolate cake for breakfast the next morning. I also discovered about a year too late that my son had outgrown his underwear. Gives a new spin to “tighty whities.”
Finally Remembering to brush my toddler’s teeth at bedtime. No fruits or veggies with any meals cause I need to go to the store. Having to run the washing machine again (maybe a few times!) because the clothes have mildewed.
I made homemade cinnamon rolls for my husband’s birthday this year. It was so much work and I was so exhausted that I let my 2 year old eat them for breakfast, lunch, and you guessed it… Dinner too!
I let my boys pee in the backyard when they’re outside playing, for simplicity and so they don’t track dirt into the house over and over. Apparently, I’ve failed to make sure they know the backyard is the ONLY outdoor place they can pee, because they’ve ALL (4 of them) peed outside in public places (planters, playgrounds, etc).
Signing up to bring a friend & her sweet little family dinner after bringing home a new baby.. And not remembering until the day after I was assigned.
Just today, I took my two year old to my financial appointment and thought there was a funny smell in the room. I realized as I was leaving that my daughter had completely soaked and pooped through her diaper and clothes . She was the funny smell apparently.
My two year old son walked across the street without me having a clue.
Fell asleep before it was time to pick our son up from school when he was in kindergarten and the office had to call me, I was so embarrassed!! And felt so bad that my son thought his momma forgot him!
With my first daughter I was getting ready for her 3 day old check up and feeling pretty confident I even mentioned to my mom that this was way easier than I thought it would be and I didn’t understand why moms were always late to everything. About halfway there I looked down and noticed I was wearing my fuzzy pink slippers. I hadn’t changed into my shoes. I guess this new mom thing wasn’t so easy after all the nurses had a good laugh about it.
when Elle’s told me she had to go potty- Not wanting to go back into the store I did something I thought I would never do…..opened my car door for some privacy and let her go potty on the ground, in our parking spot. I was holding her while she was going and heard her grunt. I knew before even looking that she had gone #2….not knowing what to do and in a moment of panic, I calmly put her in her carseat- got in my car……and made sure to back over her #2
I always fail at laundry, so I’m constantly telling my Littles to find their cleanest dirty pair (pants, socks, shirt, etc…) and put that on
Yesterday Grace walked upstairs after I asked her to get changed and she declared “Mom, I found my cleanest dirty pair!”
I was secretly upset at myself because once again I failed at having clean clothes for her, but mostly I was proud that she found her cleanest dirty pair and didn’t even bat an eye!!!
There was that time when the chicken got locked in the minivan over night… I think my husband described it as a poop explosion. We were late to church that day….
With 5 kids I forget things all the time, especially diapers! I was visiting a friends house and the kids were playing for a while when one of my kids told me Nora had a poopy diaper. I checked my purse for a diaper, none there. I went to my car to go find one, but came up empty. We decided the best thing was to grab a pair of underwear that belonged to my friends little boy and put a maxi pad in the underwear! That is what Nora wore for about and hour until we headed home!
Ummm… How about EVERY Sunday morning when I feed my kids their breakfast, strap on their shoes and do their hair all while sitting in the front row at church during worship. (This one is from my dear friend–in our church! Her husband leads worship and I love that she frees him up to serve, and sits beaming in the front row feeding her kids breakfast. 😉
I went to Church, so tired with a new baby, one of my friends was holding the baby for me, after the service I went home. I was home for about 15 min when I received a call from my friend. She asked me if I forgot something at the church. I looked around, nope, I have my purse etc. She said what about the baby!! She laughed, my daughter still reminds me, she is 29 now!
{Oh dear Mamas, I pray a little comic relief lightens your load today, and you know you are not alone. We are with you and God is with you on this mommy-hood adventure. Have a blessed weekend; thanks for reading.}
Beware of taking your kids to church :)
This week, Passion Week, is one of my favorite times of the year. Easter gives us an opportunity to invite people to church more easily than at other times. As you probably know, many people visit church on Easter even if they don’t usually attend.
That’s great. Sort of.
Several years ago I heard a fabulous sermon on godly parenting and it’s haunted me ever since. The pastor gave an interesting illustration: He made the rather bold point that if we, as parents, are just giving our children a little tiny dose of Jesus we may be doing them more harm than good. We may, in fact, be preventingthem from wholeheartedly trusting and following Christ as adults.
Consider immunizations. When we give someone a flu shot, we’re actually giving them what? A little tiny dose of the flu. Give them just enough and it will keep them from getting the full-blown flu. The natural reaction of the body is able to ward off and render harmless the flu virus.
Is it possible to immunize our children from Jesus?
Studies have often shown that those who are soured most on Christianity are not those people who have had no exposure to church and the Bible, but rather are those who, as children, either have bad experiences in the church or parents who sat in pews on Sunday but showed zero evidence of living out that faith the other six days of the week.
They had a tiny dose and therefore were apparently immune to the full-blown effect of the risen Lord.
Why is this? Because a parent who models a half-hearted or Sunday-morning faith is essentially saying, “I know all about this Jesus guy and He’s not significant enough for me to actually change my life. It’s just not that big of a deal.”
That, friends, is a scary message to give our children.
It’s not just that we haven’t given our children enough religious experience, it’s that we’ve proven by our lives that there are no real-life implications of believing in God. Kids aren’t stupid. They have great noses and can smell BS a mile away.
Why would they want to believe in something that doesn’t matter? So they abandon ship. Of course, they hold this stance only until they have their own children. Then they decide they want their children to “have religion”, so they wind up doing the exact same routine as their parents. No real faith, just going through the motions. And in these motions, another generation is immunized from faith in Christ. Frightening.
Along this same vein, a paragraph from Annie Dillard’s An American Childhood has always haunted me in a similar way. Dillard reminisces her fond memories of summer Presbyterian church camp:
“The adult members of society adverted to the Bible unreasonably often. What arcana! Why did they spread this scandalous document before our eyes? If they had read it, I thought, they would have hid it. They didn’t recognize the vivid danger that we would, through repeated exposure, catch a case of its wild opposition to their world. Instead they bade us study great chunks of it, and think about those chunks, and commit them to memory, and ignore them. By dipping us children in the Bible so often, they hoped, I think, to give our lives a serious tint, and to provide us with quaintly magnificent snatches of prayer to produce as charms while, say, being mugged for our cash or jewels.” (p. 134)
Did you READ that? It’s startling. The women is a literary genius, of course, but she’s also hitting the nail on the head, and the conviction is well-earned. If our lives have not been transformed, utterly and completely transformed by the power of the gospel, then what are we doing teaching it to our children?
The gospel is scandalous; its claims are spectacular, it is “wild opposition to the world”. How tragic it would be if we taught our children to study Christ’s claims, “commit them to memory, and ignore them.” Wow. Is that not what we are doing when we ourselves ignore them? Are we not then merely giving our children’s lives a “serious tint” and giving them “quaintly magnificent snatches of prayer to produce as charms”?
Please, please hear my heart in this: I do hope we all take our children to church this weekend. And every weekend. But more than that I hope and pray that we are convinced of this scandalous, life-changing gospel found within the pages of Scripture: It is the power of salvation to all who believe (Rom. 1:16).
The life and death and resurrection of Jesus Christ changes everything.
May it do just that in us … and our kids.
{Thanks so much for reading.}