Children Paying The Price

Hurting Our Children:

In our 24/7, multiple-news-outlet day a story has to be pretty bad to give us that knot in the stomach feeling.  The report of the death of three-year-old Acen King got my attention.  Acen was on a shopping trip with his grandmother.  There was a road-rage incident at a stop sign.  An angry motorist, got out of his car and fired into the car Acen was in.  A little boy died over a few seconds' delay at a stop sign.     It's sad enough that one little guy died in such a senseless way.  The reason, though, that this tragedy got to me is because we do this all the time.   Little people grow up in need, or, like Acen, don't get to grow up at all, because of the destructive habits of the adults in their lives. Dad needs to prove his manhood, or mom needs to find herself.  The kids pay the price. In my neighborhood it is common to see forty and fifty thousand dollar pickups.  Too often they're driven by folk who can't come close to affording them.  Guess who ends up on the short end? Same with houses, clothes, toys, and meals in restaurants. The ways youngsters end up paying the price go far beyond finances.  The emotional, developmental, and educational price that our children pay is far higher. Here's an idea.  How about if the grown-ups actually act like they are grown up. It's STTA.

Kids Who Get It:

Something To Think About, Kids who get it:

My lovely wife, Kathy, teaches preschoolers on Sunday Nights.  She really enjoys hanging out with the Gopher Buddies.  You can look at the  picture and see why.  This was at a little hayride we set up for them last fall. This past Sunday night she was teaching them a foundational Bible story, Eve and Adam's eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. (Genesis 3) Kathy had spread rocks around the room to illustrate the abundance of trees in the Garden of Eden from which Adam and Eve could have eaten.  Their snack helped them realize that God had given the first couple all they needed, and more.  At a critical time in the lesson a three-year-old announced with wide eyes, "They disobeyed." Indeed, and we have been doing so ever since.  "All have sinned and come short of the glory of God."  (Romans 3:23)  And as Eve and Adam discovered, "The wages of sin is death."  (Romans 6:23)  The same God Who provided for the our first ancestors with the abundance of the garden, has provided salvation in Jesus Christ for all who turn to Him in faith.  Last night when Kathy told me about Gopher Buddies, she was still excited.  "He got it!" she told me and a couple of after church guests. Have you gotten it? Look at this link below to find out more. It's STTA Here is a site where you can find out about Jesus Christ and His plan for you.  You'll find several opportunities to explore.  If we can help you, let us know.  covingtonbiblechurch.com

Wide-Eyed Wonder:

I'm involved in a slow--because of who I am--intermittent--because of other responsibilities and interupptions--reading of Millard Erickson's Theology.  It's a good sized book over a thousand pages long.

When I opened the text this morning, my marker was on a major division page.  The section it introduces is about one-hundred-fifteen pages long. 

 

"PART FOUR

What God Does"

I opened the book right after reading a Facebook posting.  A sharp, perceptive, preschooler asked his mom, "Why doesn't God make "broken germs"?"

For those of you aren't as perceptive as this young man, broken germs wouldn't be able to do what germs do, which is make people sick.  I'm fairly sure that after working on it for forty years I still can't give this budding theodicy-seeker an answer that he would find satisfying.  So, I was already in a humbled state when I opened the book of the learned Doctor and saw the headline, "What God Does."

I immediately thought:  I could have saved a lot of paper and ink.  Dr. Erickson, in your revised edition I propose that Part Four consist of this:

Whatever He Wants!*

 

 (I realize, of course, that that might require a couple hundred pages of footnotes.)

Lord, may I never get over the wide-eyed wonder that You are greater than I can know.  Thanks for the reminder that mental boxes are as inadequate for containing You, as are cardboard cartons.

Help me to continue to learn more about you, and to gain a greater grasp of the truth of Romans 8.

And, Lord, I look forward to a day when all germs will be broken.  Come quickly, Lord.

Amen 

(I Suffer from hangups.  I didn't feel right putting a link in a prayer, so here it is:  Romans 8.)

It's STTA.

On our website, covingtonbblechurch.com, put your cursor over the "Devotional and Study Aids" tab and select "Thirty Days of Praying the Names and Attributes of God."  Follow the link.

   

There is lots of information about the one Who died so that we could have life at our webpage, covingtonbiblechurch.com.  Click on "Life's most important question."

  

 (* I realize, of course, that that might require a couple hundred pages of footnotes.)

To the Barricades--Fighting the Idiocy:

I really hate to do this, but some folk who don't know me might read this, so I need to put a preamble on today's STTA.  If you do know me, you can skip to the black font if you want.

• This is the fourth in a four-part series.  You need to see the other three posts for this one to make sense.  (Scroll down to the March 5 post and start there.)
• I'm a long way from being a political activist.  In fact I try to keep the church out of anything associated with partisan politics.  
• I am a supporter of public education.  While I am also a supporter of home, and private education, I realize that without a strong public system many (most) of our youngsters will grow up uneducated.

I want to make a couple of observations and suggestions.  I hope that parents will responsibly and creatively put them to use.

Bureaucracy produced, zero-tolerance rules make zero sense.  We should quit acting as if they do.  

The Prophet Micah gave us one of the great ethical statements of all time:  

Do justice, to love kindness, 

And to walk humbly with your God.

(Micah 6:8)

 

Unlike the various zero-tolerance policies there is an inherent tension in Micah's words.  Is this a time when my emphasis ought to be justice, or should kindness (mercy) be shown?  And wrap all of that in humility--rather than the incredible bureaucratic hubris that says "I've got every possible scenario covered with my one simple rule."  

No, you don't!

In Jesus day the Pharisees were the zero-tolerance guys.  In Jesus grace and truth are found.  Let's not be on the wrong side.  (See here for an example of the conflict.)

 

We create zero-tolerance policies to remove unfairness, and to make an absolute statement against something our system decides is intolerable.

• We correctly identify that drugs are a problem among young people, so we create a zero-tolerance policy that will suspend a seventeen year old, who we trust to operate an automobile and cook our supper at the local burger-joint, for having an aspirin in his backpack.
• We conclude that students in school need to get along, so we write a zero-tolerance rule that causes a young man who saves his classmate's life to be suspended for three days. 
• We conclude that guns are bad (a debatable concept, to say the least) and so we throw kids out of class for chewing pop-tarts into the shape of a gun.

As parents we should have zero-tolerance for such idiocy.

More and more school systems act as if children belong to them.  

It's not that long ago.  My son, a good student, wanted to go deer hunting in the mornings of deer season.  To do so he would miss a class at High School.  "Son, as long as your grades are ok, I don't care."  

Several days later:

"ring-ring"

"This is Mr. Smith, Chad's absolutely essential class teacher.  Do you know that Chad hasn't been in class for the past five days?"

"Yes."

(Surprise on the other end.)

"How are his grades?"  

"He's doing OK."

"Let me know when he isn't."

That is a truncated version of the conversation, but the gist is there.  This is my son, and forgive me Mr. Teacher, butI need to decide how he should best send his November mornings.  He has shown himself responsible enough to make this choice.  He has earned the right, and besides that I like venison and don't hunt myself.

"But," the educational bureaucracy objects, "If we allow that, some kids just won't come to school at all.  Yes, and I'm willing to work with you to address that.  What I am not prepared to do is to zero-tolerate responsible students and parents into a corner that makes zero sense.

OK, if this were were a sermon it would be 12:15.  I need to quit.  A couple of suggestions:

To the parents of Arundel County Maryland.  Bake every cookie for every party, back sale, and reception in the shape of a revolver.  Use jelly-beans for bullets.  Make sure every P,B&J sandwich is in the shape of gun.  Force the zero-tolerance enforcers to reduce the head count in every class to zero.

To the parents in Florida:  Tell the system that you have zero-tolerance for a system that is so intolerant of good sense that it cannot tell the difference between a kid who is starting a fight and one who is saving a life.  In honor of the gun-snatcher's heroism declare a three-day holiday.  When the zero-tolerant types say the three days have to be made up, declare another one.  Let the bureaucracy know that you have zero-tolerance for a system that punishes good behavior.

To parents everywhere:  Stop tolerating a system that lays claim to our children.  The schools exist to help us educate our children.  Let the system know that we have zero tolerance for a bureaucracy that doesn't understand that.

 

It's STTA. 

Something's Wrong, #2

SOMETHING  TO THINK ABOUT

Reducing child-rearing to its simplest terms, one could describe it as, encouraging good behavior and discouraging bad.  "Don't hit your sister!"  "Share your toy with Johnny."  Recent news gives evidence that our culture is doing the opposite.  Yesterday's STTA tells of a "policy" that reflects our society's growing unwillingness to take a chance in order to save a life.  Other news idicates that it is even worse than that.  In our absurd focus on eliminating and controlling things that some people use to do wicked things, we actually end up punishing innocent or even heroic activity.   We can all take comfort in knowing that our schools are being kept safe from deadly weapons, like the one pictured to the left.  I only hope that Al-Qaeda doesn't figure out how to gnaw bread into atomic weapons!  I likewise hope that Arundel County, Maryland, officials are conducting sufficient investigation to find out whether this pastry-based killing machine has a high capacity magazine.  We have to put a stop to such things. Well maybe not. While it is important to take a stand against pastry guns--I mean, after all, these things are invisible to metal detectors--we can't leave disarming bad guys to mere mortals.  Such work must be left to professionals--people with the keen eye and steely nerves that enable them to tell the difference between breakfast and terrorist threats.  In Florida a young man observed a classmate pointing a 22 revolver--non-pastry version--at another student.  The report is that rather than threatening to eat the revolver the young man was threatening to shoot his fellow bus-rider.  Not realizing that gun-removal, pastry or steel, must be left to professionals, the young man stepped in and wrestled the gun away from the would-be shooter.  Fortunately no people were harmed or toaster-pastries chewed.  In order to discourage amateurs--you know, the kind of folk who can't spot a deadly pastry-gun in plain daylight--from saving the lives of others, the young man received a three-day suspension.  One can only hope that the young man is kept out of school permanently.  We have to protect our children; they are our most precious asset. Enough.  It's not funny! I know many educators who are terribly bothered about these examples of common-sense, being replaced by senseless bureaucratic rules.  We need to pray for these points-of-light.  Systems that reward heroism with suspensions are not friendly to teachers and administrators who show courageous Godliness and good sense.  Pray for them. These two examples are just two of the more notable examples of parents being replaced by the education machine.  Mom, Dad, resist this tendency.   I'm so dumb that I think that the only danger posed by pop-tarts is tooth-decay and obesity.  Me, I would have given the Florida lad a medal.  Obviously, I don't know anything about educating children, but if you want to listen to someone foolish enough to believe that parents, not bureaucracies ought to raise children, tune in tomorrow.  In the mean time pray. It's STTA.

It's HARD!

Why are parents so unwilling to encourage--is "force" to strong a word--their kids to do hard things? I'm talking about everything from cleaning a room, to eating vegetables, to dealing with a painful social encounter.
I fear the answer stares back at us from the mirror. I don't expect my kids to do anything hard, because I'm not willing to do anything that measures beyond a "3" on the diff-i-cult-o-meter. Hebrews 12: 4-11 gives the perfect example of parenting. It comes from the perfect Father.
Read it. The text is full of hard things. Our heavenly Father brings the difficult into our lives because He loves us.

When we say we aren't going to make our child do something that he or she ought to do, because it is hard, can we really say we are doing it because we love them? Or is it possible that we don't make our kids do the hard-but-right because it is hard for us to do so?

I fear that an honest--and therefore painful, another hard thing we tend to avoid--examination may reveal that the reason we are not willing to require the difficult but right in the life of our child is because we have abandoned that in our own life long ago.

Child discipline begins with self-discipline.

It's STTA.