Once Upon a Time: A Beautiful Maiden, Buddy and Me

Once upon a time, there was a beautiful maiden. She was married to a handsome and kind man. Her father-in-law died and so her mother-in-law came to live with them. To everyone’s amazement they all got along and would have lived happily ever after except then the story would be too short.

So, her husband died. The beautiful maiden knew not what to do. She loved her mother-in-law, but the custom of her husband’s family was that she should marry her dead husband’s brother and have children with him to carry on her dead husband’s lineage. 

But, her mother-in-law was old and kind of wrinkly, and her prospects of her mother-in-law finding a new husband and having a son with him were slim. And, even if she did, the maiden would have to wait until he was of age and then she’d have to marry a kid she helped to raise and it would just be really awkward.

But alas, she couldn’t leave her mother-in-law’s side. When her mother-in-law decided to return to her homeland in order to find help from her family, she told the maiden to go back to her father’s house where she could find a new husband and forget their crazy custom.

She looked her mother-in-law square in the eye and said, “Don't force me to leave you. Don't make me turn back from following you. Wherever you go, I will go, and wherever you stay, I will stay. Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God.” And, that settled that.

When they arrived in the old country, the mother-in-law told her of another way, even weirder than the first. It was a long shot, but just maybe. The maiden learned that the wealthy man who’s grain she had been picking was a distant cousin of her husband and a close enough relative to fulfill the responsibility of the custom. If she could marry him and bear his children, she could preserve the line of her dead husband.

He was giving her attention and treated her better than he treated his own servant girls!

So, she took a big risk. She slipped into the barn and lay down by his feet while he was sleeping. Then, she pulled the blanket off his feet so they would get cold and eventually he woke up.

When he did, he found her and knew what she wanted. He told her to go back to sleep and he would take care of everything. They went back to sleep and in the morning she slipped out of the barn before anyone else got up so that no nasty rumors got started.

After a little finagling, they got married and lived happily ever after.

The End.

Buddy, our dog, is a lot like the maiden from this story. He sometimes wants my attention. So, he leans. He covers. He presses in. He will walk right up next to me, not even looking at me. He will get as close as possible to my legs and then lean against me. Not demanding anything from me. He wants me to know that he is there. He wants me to feel that he is there. Sometimes, he’ll lay down right there on my feet. He is being a constant and faithful presence, waiting for me. And, he can be very patient. He will wait for my touch, my stroke, my “Good dog.” (Unless he hears a car door or someone walking up the steps, of course. Then he is off, springing to action.)

We need to be like the maiden and like Buddy. We need to lay at God’s feet and just be there, patiently, lovingly, faithfully waiting for Him to acknowledge us. We need to be persistent, regardless of the circumstances of our lives and, wait for him to speak, to encourage, to lead, to guide, to simply say, “You are good.” Yeah, the car door slamming, the phone ringing, the schedule bustling may distract us, but we need to get to resting at his feet more and more.

With our patience and faithfulness we say to God, “Wherever you go, I will go, and wherever you stay, I will stay.”

He will speak. He promises to. We just need to wait and listen.

"The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep respond to his voice. He calls his sheep by name and leads them out of the pen. After he has brought out all his sheep, he walks ahead of them. The sheep follow him because they recognize his voice."- John 10:3-4

Tonight’s Family Time

Tonight’s Family Time

Katie, my teenage daughter, has a special gift. When she was little and we would have the teens over, which during school months was usually once a week for pasta night, Katie would attach herself to one of the teen girls. She would sit with them on their lap, take them up to her room to play Barbie or build houses out of books, and sit next to them at dinner. She would be completely focused, totally devoted to that one teen.

Fortunately, Katie has an adorable smile and deep, delicious dimples. That teen probably left feeling truly loved and valued. Katie’s day would have been vastly different if that teen hadn’t shown up that day. They felt important because they were important to her.

Katie is grown now, but continues to have that ability to totally focus on someone else. She can spend hours with a baby, carrying them, feeding them, and even changing diapers. She sets aside whatever other things she may be interested in and absorbs herself in the life of that one child. She makes them smile and they feel loved and valued.

I pointed out how Katie and Anna had both done that with Brady on Sunday, the one and a half year old who is part of our home church. They had each at times, walked with him, played with him, gone upstairs and back down with him, and loved him. They set aside whatever else they may have wanted to do and focused on him. Ethan and Ryan did something similar with Ethan W., Brady’s 5 year old brother. Ryan left with a cut lip from the sword and Ethan with a headache from where his head hit the tile, but that's just because boys are different from girls.

I told them how important it is to give someone our whole self, to really give someone our full attention and show someone that we really care.

“That’s why I like being the host, instead of the guest,” added Katie. When prompted, she added, “When you’re the host, you are supposed to do whatever your guest wants, so I like that. But, when I am the guest, I don’t care what we do. I just want to do whatever they want. So, in the beginning it is harder, more awkward, to be a guest.”

Anna agreed but then remembered a girl from her old school that was very talkative but never seemed to say anything. She added, “Some people, it’s hard to do that with. There was a girl last year that I tried to give her my attention when I could and just listen and focus on her. But, sometimes I had to say, ‘No. I can’t talk now,’ or else I couldn’t deal with her. I remember making a conscious decision at times to listen to her and just give her my full attention. Other times I couldn’t.” And, she smiled, “One time, we got into this talk about heaven and horses in heaven and it was really good. Really good! Who would have thought that I could have a conversation like that with her? But, we did!”

Ethan piped up, “Yeah, some people it is really hard to do that with. Definitely.”

I told them about one of the best memories I have growing up. When I was in my late teens, my great grandmother came to New York for a visit from her home state of West Virginia. I would usually see her once a year when we would go down to visit her, but it was rare for her to come to New York. This trip was different though because she was suffering with Alzheimer’s. She was reverting, so it seemed, back to her childhood. She kept asking if she could go home now and wondered what time it was. She was referring to her childhood home from over 80 years earlier. And, the more she asked the more agitated and anxious she would become if someone didn’t answer her.

She wasn’t able to do much, but she enjoyed simple puzzles. So, I set her up next to the dining room table and there we sat doing puzzle after puzzle. I just sat and talked with her and helped her find pieces and answered her questions. I gave her my undivided attention. I listened, and I learned to love her as she was. I gave her my full attention for a few hours and 25 years later I still remember it.

“You’re good at that,” Ethan said.

“What?” I wondered what he was referring to.

“You’re good at that, listening to people and making them feel important.”

“Thank you.” That meant a lot coming from Ethan who I had spent many hours with, lying next to him in his bed and listening to him. I guess he understood what I was doing and why. It was making a difference.

“But,” I reminded them, “remember Ethan’s warning." Recalling something he had said a couple of months earlier. "If we always focus on what other people want and never take care of ourselves and what we want, we’ll become miserable and then we won’t be any good to anybody.”

We all shook our heads in agreement and I ended our time together with a prayer asking God for the ability to be present with people and listen and love them by being focused on them.

Many times our devotions don’t seem to tap into anything profound and sometimes I wonder if we are just wasting time, but then we have talks like this and I remember how important it is to just make opportunities, not try to force anything, and let the Spirit lead when He will.

Giving someone our full attention can change a person's day or, maybe you've heard the stories, even save a life. Show someone true love, listen to them and give them your undivided attention.

(Since Valentine's Day is tomorrow, why not think of someone that you could call or visit? Pray and ask God if there is someone that you know that may not have anyone special to spend Valentine's Day with and give them your full attention even if it is just for a little while.)

Labels Stifle Growth

Labels Stifle Growth

This was a conversation amongst the Dads at a birthday party I recently attended:

"My son was labeled 'multi-disabled.' And, I was like, label him whatever you want just help to learn."

"Really? One teacher told me she thought my son had Aspergers and so we did the research. We went to the pediatrician to see whether we needed to face this and deal with it. The pediatrician told us there was no sign of him having Aspergers. We went back to the teacher, and she clung to her diagnosis."

"Our son's teacher said, 'Not that I advocate putting kids on meds, but you might want to get him checked by your doctor to see if he has ADHD.' The third time she made that recommendation it was clear that she was advocating to put him on meds."

"I'm a principal and the reality is, teachers have no expertise in diagnosing this stuff. But, because they are teachers, some parents assume that they do." He then went on to explain how shocked some of his fellow educators are to find out that his children are home-schooled.

Labels are used to put kids in categories so that they can more easily be fit into the educational system. The system only works if we can get the kids through easily and smoothly without clogging up the gears. And, if you or your child start clogging things up, you will have some labels thrown your way.

We all do it. It is how our society works. There are just too many variables to give everyone an honest assessment all of the time. So, we say things like, "He's a conservative" or "She's a feminist," "Those homeless people" or "Those rich people," or we use racial slurs or homophobic language.

Labels kill relationships before they start.

We label so that we don't have to take the time to get to know the real people that we are talking about and so we make a million assumptions about them.

Children are often labeled by "experts" because they need to "document" their history so they can "get services." The system works this way, but as parents, we shouldn't. Actually, as human beings who love other human beings we shouldn't.

Labels stifle growth.

Instead of using labels to identify those around us, we need to start learning their stories. There is power in knowing someone's story. It reminds us that we are referring to a person with all of their strengths and weaknesses, good qualities and bad, past hurts and future promise.

Robert Coles, whose research led him to interview children, often multiple times over the course of years, described rightly the role of the researcher as learner. With all of his education and experience, he was tempted to enter into conversations with children in order to try to fit them into his psychoanalytic paradigms. Early in his career, he realized that if he wanted to advance the field of research he was in, he would need to let the children teach him.

He realized that only they could teach him about the ways in which children understood their world. From this new vantage point, he was able to discover great depth in the spirituality of children.

As parents, we too, are learners. We must not assume that because of our education or experience or simply our role as parent, that we have to fit our children into a category in order to understand them or worse yet, fix them.

Labeling our child "strong-willed" or "shy", "stubborn" or "promiscuous" doesn't help us or them to grow spiritually.

The tools that we have at our disposal can help us, but the labels oversimplify our understanding of our children and give us an excuse to not continue to grow in our understanding of them.

We made this mistake with out youngest child, Ryan. For years we introduced our family to new acquaintances and inevitably, when we got to Ryan, he would hide behind Mommy or bury his face in Daddy's pant leg. And, so it would go, "And, this is Ryan. ... He's our shy one."

Ryan entered a new school in his third grade year. At our first parent teacher conference, I mentioned that we were trying to change that habit of labeling him and begin positively reinforcing other behaviors that were more outgoing and expressive of his inner feelings and thoughts.

His teacher, an experienced educator, agreed that that would be good and recalled, "I remember the first day you came to see the classroom. I was told that he was shy before I even knew his name."

Let your children be themselves. Emphasize and reward those characteristics that you want to see them grow into. Point out when they work hard, say kind words, face a fear, or demonstrate generosity.

How different Ryan might be today if we had introduced him differently, "And, this is Ryan, you are going to love getting to know him!"

How different Ryan will be a year from now because we have removed the burden of this label from him?

Adventures in Nonversation

Adventures in Nonversation

Nonversations happen almost every day of our lives. Whether it is at work or school, on the phone or in person. We engage in these pseudo-conversations where one or more of the participants has no interest in being in the conversation at all. You know the kind that I mean.

Nonversations with our children can happen at any age. Whether it is your toddler pulling on your pant leg and you replying, "Uh huh ... uh huh. OK, sweetie." Only to finally look down and see them handing you their full diaper which they have somehow managed to pull of.

Or your school age child saying, "Mommy. Mommy. Mommy. Mommy. Mommy." in the grocery store. Checking your list and coupons and giving the baby a cracker so he won't eat the cart handle, "What?!" "I want to study animals in the Amazon rainforest!"

Or our teenage child's non-responses, "How was your day?" "Uhh." "How was your test in Biology?" "Fine." "Do you have much homework?" "No."

Sometimes it can seem like when they are ready to talk, we aren't, and when we are ready, they aren't.

There is one other type of nonversation that kills communication with our children: parent centered instead of youth centered conversations.

How do these affect our relationship with our teens?

Dollahite and Thatcher, social scientists who did research with 74 highly religious families, used the term “parent centered” conversations in their research. I call them nonversations. Nonversations are lecture-style. Parents are transmitters and not receivers. They ask their children questions because they want to give them answers. They emphasize the power imbalance in the family. Parents have power and authority and teens don’t.

This is an extension of the idea that children should be seen and not heard.

We don’t usually set out to relate to our children this way. We genuinely want to have a relationship with our kids, but we are human and we love our children so much that things get confusing.

Our fear and insecurities motivate us to try to keep our teens safe. We are afraid that either they will do something to hurt themselves or someone else will do something to them.

And, we know some of those hurts leave scars. We are afraid for them now and we are afraid for their future. “What if…” begins to be our motto. And, we choose safety and security over relationship with our child.

It can sound like this, “I would rather have my child hate me because I’m overprotective, then love me and wind up in a ditch somewhere or worse yet, dead.”

That fear gives rise to a desire to control our children. Even in the highly religious families that were studied, which tend to stress hierarchical relationships based on the natural disparity of power between the child and the adult, they are still able to have youth centered conversations. So the content of the conversations, the worldview which you hold, and the guidance that you offer do not determine whether or not a conversation is youth centered or parent centered.

The tone of the conversation, the parents’ motivations, and the relational openness of the parents determine whether conversations are youth centered or parent centered nonversations.

In a culture that highly values individualism, youth centered conversations demonstrate an increased willingness to allow autonomy and freedom to initiate and fully participate in religious/spiritual conversations. This fosters spiritual growth and gives you an opportunity to shape some of the faith choices your child makes.[1]

Find ways to listen to your child without correcting them or judging their responses. Just listen and learn and wait until they ask for your help or advice. Enjoy them and maybe dream with them about going to the Amazon rainforest. Who knows, they might end up there someday!

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[1] David C. Dollahite and Jennifer Y. Thatcher, “Talking About Religion,” Journal of Adolescent Research 23, no. 5 (2008): 638.