“Having grown weary and impatient, I want to snap and say, “It won’t work, not in the long run. Marriage is hard enough when you have two believers who are completely in harmony spiritually. Just spare yourself the heartache and get over it.” Yet such harshness is neither in line with the gentleness of Christ, nor convincing.”
Ten minutes later when they’re bored with your gift, the shine may have come off a bit. Still, it’s more blessed right? The thing is, I think the western societies in which we’re raising our children, are the sorts of societies where for most adults receiving is by far the superior alternative. So much so, that receiving or getting is seen as more of a human right really. You only have to think back to the summer riots in London and the many links to consumerism to see that attitude in its grossest expression.
If, generally speaking, those are the sorts of adults we are producing and I want my children to be different from that (less rioting would be good for a start), then I need to start training now. However, the early signs are not encouraging. This year, really for the first time, we are helping our three year old son discover the joy of giving. His initial reaction was grave concern, ‘I’ll still get presents won’t I?’ but even with that fear calmed, he remains unconvinced that giving is anywhere close to as good as getting.
We want giving to be in many ways, it’s own reward, we want the act of giving to radiate joy and fun, and lead to more cheerful giving. We’re going to introduce giving to those poorer than ourselves, and other such things, because giving is a habit that needs early introduction. It seems we have a default setting and it’s not ‘give’.
Any ideas, how have you seen giving best demonstrated, shared and taught to children?
It’s why we at Breathe made this little video. Why not watch it, or better yet watch it with some friends and think through your response. For more resources on the video check out Conspiracy of Freedom.
‘Who’s your Saviour, Noah?’
‘Daddy?’
‘No, try again’
‘Mummy?’
‘No. Who do we read about every night?’
‘Oh, Goliath!’
‘Not quite, try again’
‘Pharaoh!’
‘Again, not quite. Who makes things better?’
‘Oh, Jesus!’
‘Yes, that’s right.’ Sigh.
So the sum total of my instruction so far is that Jesus ranks after Goliath and Pharaoh. Ho hum.
Burk having briefly outlined his case ends with this,
“Despite the pronouncements of the judge in Texas, parents who love their children will make use of non-abusive physical discipline (Prov. 13:24). This is what the Bible teaches, and we should be vigilant not to let the spirit of the age make us think otherwise.”
We don’t and haven’t smacked our children (although the thought has crossed my mind from time to time). But I have a problem with the way Burk frames his case when he says, ‘Parents who love their children will make use of non-abusive physical discipline.’
Here’s part of my problem. In Sweden smacking your children is against the law and has been since 1979, in fact as a crime it falls under assault. So to smack your children is to physically assault them as if I was punching a stranger in the street. Whatever the rights and wrongs of that approach by Sweden, for the last 30 years it has been illegal to smack your child. So, what use then is Burk’s advice to parents and counsel from Scripture? None at all if you want to stay a family.
Would this be a case of obeying God rather than man and smack regardless (Acts 5:29)? It would be an odd hill to die on I think. Instead it would be a case of seeing these instructions not as essential or necessary for obedience, discipline or love or to put it more clearly it’s not a command. The Bible is not commanding that a parent must smack but must discipline. I doubt those that smack use actual rods or staffs, so they interpret.
So we must find other rods and staffs, more creative means of effective discipline and we’re glad to do so. Smacking my children is not an essential for a Christian parent, discipline on the other hand is and the two are not the same.
According to that post, it ‘takes square aim at these accelerating trends, while offering parents—and children—hopeful alternatives. Esolen shows how imagination is snuffed out at practically every turn:
Which is what we say in this video called Play from Breathe and offer a few questions and suggestions to a better way forward.
Instead books, running, playing with my boy and hanging out with my wife. I’m sure I’ll do something with Anna but at under 2 months old she’s not up to much yet.
Various pre-written blog posts will appear throughout the week so don’t disappear and if there is such a thing as normal service on this site, it will resume on the 21st.
We were reading a Bible story and came to David and Goliath (we’re using this book) and we read this line from David.
“‘I shall fight Goliath’ declared David boldly. ‘I dare because God will help me.’”
Noah just started repeating ‘I dare, I dare, I dare’. All very cute. Then Emma reminded him that it was because David knew God would help him. My two year old paused and did some thinking and then said,
“Jesus will help me.”
Soon after that he started blethering rubbish and we gave him some milk to drink. But it struck me that this is faith, this is near the core of my understanding of salvation and life as a disciple of Jesus. I am a sinner but I believe ‘Jesus will help me.’ I dare to pray for healings or miracles because I believe ‘Jesus will help me.’ I speak to people in situations where my wisdom is floundering but I open my mouth because I believe ‘Jesus will help me.’ I struggle, I fall, I fail, I succeed. Jesus will help me.
The cost is too high (on average £20,000), the content too light, the preparation often non-existent and for many it is paper over cracks. Brown is right when he says,
“What you’re doing isn’t a step into fairyland. And if it does turn out to be the gateway to a new life, that is one that will have to be built over time and unglamorously with the unpromising materials of the old one.”
But not all people approach marriage like that – a couple of weeks ago at the wedding of some dear friends you saw the culmination of a thoughtful process, a discovery of friendship, a journey to understanding the vows and promises. Cost had been counted and joyful, loving decisions had been made.
Not all the guests would have seen that, but for me that made the wedding more special. I’d seen some of the journey, participated in some of the discussions, watched and prayed for it. So when the moment came to make a vow of commitment to another person – you could endorse, support, celebrate all that was being said. It was done with gratitude to God who had led them and guided them, the songs and worship weren’t part of the ceremony but one of the reasons for it.
Wonderful stuff, only slightly marred by having to wrestle a fidgety two year old while being frustrated at my own lack of patience.
But this is why community is so important, relationships are vulnerable when they become disconnected from community (which I have sadly seen too many times) and that rarely ends well. They are vulnerable if they are built apart from friendship, accountability and genuine scrutiny. they are more vulnerable still if they try to survive without it. Our relationships are a curious mix of personal, private and public and we run grave risks when we lose that third component.
So while some weddings definitely make me cringe and in my gloomier moments wonder when they will become another sad statistic. Others remind me of the beauty and wonder and joy of a publicly covenanted relationship.
OK, it may be just me but do they look alike? Poor kids, the midwife said they looked liked me. My church decided that grumpy, wrinkly and purple is not a good look, for them or me!
Anyway, the point is that they (at least I think so) carry the family likeness. The father should be able to look at them and know ‘they’re my kids.’ Simple observation really, but the punch hit home. Am I carrying the father’s likeness? Do I act, think, speak, love like the Father?
Today we give thanks to God for the safe arrival of Anna Grace Whittall. She made her entrance at 9.44am, weighing in at 7lbs 15oz.
It is just amazing to think that God would choose to enter the world this way and begin life so helpless and so weak. Amazing to think that this little girl is made in the image of God and He already knows how many hairs are on her head (quite a few!).
So, here is one more reason I have to give thanks to God.
The highlighted theme of the moment is thankfulness. First I read this story and then I came across this article about struggling with thankfulness in ministry and this comment struck home,
“I think the problem is that I’m not truly thankful when God provides. I may be happy that I got the job I wanted, pleased that I made it into the right program, or relieved that we’ve paid all our bills on time again. But I don’t think I’m thankful for those things, because deep down I believe I pulled them off on my own. There’s no sense being thankful for something you do yourself.”
After that I came across this about being thankful for technology and not ‘break[ing] into fits of rage when we have to wait 2 seconds for page-loads’ and remembering that,
“It’s important that we not put ourselves in the middle of the iUniverse—even though our phones are called iPhone. It’s not about us. It’s about God and His work that he’s doing through Jesus and His church.”
Then I read this post titled, ‘when I read this I never want to complain again’ that opened with,
“Every so often, the sufferings of a fellow human being break through the consumer haze and teach us how to value life in a way that isn’t twee or glib.”
Which reminded me about PJ Smyth, a church leader and young(ish) father of three who has just been diagnosed with Hodgkins Lymphoma (cancer of the lymph glands) who writes,
“A fair few tears flow daily in the Smyth home at the moment, especially Ashleigh’s and mine. They can break out at almost anytime prompted by gratitude to the kindness and close presence of Jesus, or thankfulness to the kind words and actions of friends, or at news of the suffering of others that is already seeming to break our hearts in a fresh way, or because of tiredness and fear of the unknown.”
The message is clear, be thankful, be thankful, be thankful. Just after I graduated from teacher training a friend and I travelled round Europe by train one summer. One of the habits we cultivated on the many train journeys was to ‘count our blessings’. It’s a good habit.
Tomorrow my beautiful son turns two and he is a real joy to me. I’m grateful to him though he doesn’t know it and more grateful to Emma for the amazing job she does in raising him, but I’m yet more grateful still to God for both of them. Any day now, I hope to be equally grateful for a second child.
Despite all the challenges, I love the church I lead and being a part of the mission we’re on. Just today 93 people (at least half were guests) shared food, fun and a short service thinking about hope together. Thank you. Today a couple took a step of courageous faith and sacrifice that, I’m sure, will prove to be a blessing to our church. Thank you.
I’m grateful for a thousand other things. Thankfulness should be a mark of the Christian, no place for moaning, grumbling and complaining for the people of God, instead we overflow with thankfulness in all circumstances (1 Thess 5:18), always giving thanks to God (2 Tim 1:3) because of who God is (Rev 11:17) and for what He has given us (Jesus) is an inexpressible gift (2 Cor 9:15) that frees us from sin (Rom 6:17-18) which is why when we have given thanks we break the bread that remembers what Christ has done for us (Luke 22:19).
Be thankful, be thankful, be thankful.
Today I am going on holiday for a week to the lovely county of Kent. I’m looking forward to visiting Dover Castle, reading, resting, playing games with my family, time with my wife and son.
I shall return on the 27th after having run the London marathon on the 25th. However, I’ve blogged a bit and scheduled some posts so there should be some things to read over the next 7 or 8 days.
If you’re so inclined, do please pray for us as a family for a great rest and time together. Thank you!
Today is a busy day as most days usually are. But today it is snowing. While most of the UK has had decent amounts of the white stuff Shrewsbury has been scratching around in tiny amounts of it. Today it is snowing.
Today Noah gets up shouts ‘SNOWING’ followed by ‘Bosh’ and ‘Tray’. Translated it means ‘I want to go sliding and playing in the snow, daddy’. But today is a busy day.
I don’t always make the right decision in moments like this. Too often I choose the work, today I chose to play. And as Noah is only 18 months old, it wasn’t ever likely to be for very long, so slide down a bank on a, now very dented, tea tray and we boshed snow and fell over and got back up again.
I wonder if at the heart of the Mary and Martha story, Jesus is hoping that Martha would just choose to be with her. Work needs doing, but I wonder if sometimes God wants us to go and play, to enjoy all the bountiful goodness of all that he has made, and not spend anything in doing it.
“Nestlé is on a mission to ‘improve their products to ensure they can be enjoyed as part of a balanced, healthy lifestyle’. They’re re-launching Kit Kat – their best selling biscuit – now free from artificial colours, flavours and preservatives. Despite this, the recipe is still tainted by an ingredient much nastier than an E number – child slave labour.Thousands of children are trafficked within West Africa and forced to work on cocoa farms against their will, for long hours and in dangerous conditions. Nestlé is aware of the problem and said they would guarantee the end of trafficked labour in the cocoa industry by 2005. This hasn’t happened.
Being a powerful company, Nestlé could very well determine the conditions beans are bought in. Please badger Nestlé to make the Kit Kat recipe child-friendly, remove all traces of trafficking and go Fairtrade.”
This is their response,
“Thank you very much for your email. At Nestlé, as stated in our publicly-available business principles, practices and supplier agreements, we are against all forms of exploitation of children and any form of forced or compulsory labour. As a signatory to the Global Harkin Engel Protocol, Nestlé is committed to working with cocoa communities, Governments, NGOs and others to end child slavery, trafficking or other unacceptable labour practices on cocoa farms. We source the majority of our cocoa from the Ivory Coast and have been working to improve the lives of cocoa farmers there for many years by encouraging better farming practices, providing agricultural assistance, and working to improve labour practices and traceability in the supply chain. We are also a founding participant in the International Cocoa Initiative (ICI), an independent foundation set up in 2002 that is dedicated to ending child and forced labour in cocoa growing, and eliminating child trafficking and abusive labour practices. The ICI, a unique partnership between civil society and the cocoa industry, works to ensure that children are not exposed to unsafe tasks, helps children that are exploited and improves their access to education. Nestlé works with a number of certification organisations, including Fairtrade and Rainforest Alliance, on several coffee brands and projects. For cocoa we are currently funding a pilot scheme with UTZ working with three co operatives in the Ivory Coast and are committed to buying UTZ CERTIFIED beans from these co operatives in 2010. Thank you again for taking the trouble to contact us. We are grateful for the interest you have shown in our company.”
So they’re signed up to the right things then….
This is my son Noah and he’s just turned one. He can’t walk by himself yet, his words make no sense (unless you happen to be a car, a dog or are going anywhere – he can say ‘go’) and his main skill is a love of climbing up and down the stairs. Despite his distinct lack of theological training, few people have taught me more about God than my son.
Firstly, he has taught me about love. I love my wife Emma, but she’s more competent than me in more or less everything. Noah on the other hand is completely incompetent and quite often incontinent. Yet, I love him not because of what he can do but because He is a gift to me. I understand a little bit more now how God chooses to love imperfect, incompentent, impenitent people. Because love in the best sense of the word is a wonderful thing. I was such a reluctant father, but I have been thoroughly and joyfully converted to fatherhood. It’s great, God must absolutely love it.
“See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are.” (1Jn 3:1)
I also understand a little bit better the depth of the love the Father has for His Son. If I love Noah just a fraction of the love God has for me, an adopted son, and that love is a fraction of the love He has for only Son Jesus, then it’s no wonder that death could not keep. A love like that is an unstoppable force and woe betide any immovable object like a gravestone getting in the way of a Father’s love.
The second thing I’ve learned is what a sinner I am. My prayer every night is that God would work on Noah to become a man like Jesus and a better man than me. Jesus has perfect patience (1 Tim 1:16) and I do not. I get bored by playing the same game more than about twice, I get frustated at having to instil good eating habits into a one year old, I get cross because deep down I am just very selfish. I know the failings of my charcater, my vulnerabilities, my weaknesses, my struggles and my imperfections. By God, I need His grace, because I do not want my son to inherit or learn those things from me.
The third thing, I’ve been taught is how much life is a gift. I’ve no idea how long I’ll have with Noah. I may die or worse still I may live to see him die. It’s a horrible thought, a fear that I don’t want to admit to but it’s the truth. Life is short no matter how long we live. I don’t want to live ungratefully, I am so thankful for the gift of this little boy who smiles every day, who hasn’t in a year been in a bad mood for more than a minute. Life is not a right but an awesome privilege, life is a gift.
There are many more things but if I’m not maudlin already I soon will be so I’ll stop there.
“I’m more and more persuaded as I study Scripture that my life is intended by God to be a community project. We were designed to live in community – first, community with God and second, community with other people. We were formed to be social beings, and all of the places where I need to grow and change – the development of my gifts, my understanding, my wisdom – doesn’t happen individually. It happens in community. In addition, one of God’s best tools for revealing and changing hearts is marriage. So it’s [through community, marriage and family] that I actually become more of what God has designed me to be. You could argue that, in God’s design, the fundamental social building block of human culture is marriage. Isn’t it interesting that the marriage relationship is the picture that God uses of His relationship to us?”
“These words, ‘Father into your hands I commit my spirit,’ are every bit as frightening as Jesus’ prior cry of abandonment. Jesus is not comforting himself, he is gesturing to the Father that he is ready to face the final work that only Jesus can do.…This is the real and specific death of Jesus, the Saviour of all that has been, is, and is to come, who submits to death by our hands – ‘having said this he breathed his last.’ Dead. Jesus is dead.”
- Stanley Hauerwas, Cross Shattered Christ, p96
Two stories have hit me in the last 24 hours that remind me powerfully that our hold on life is so fragile and as a result our trust in God should increase.
First, two nights ago a friend told me how a few months ago another friend of hers lost a 3 year old child to a heart attack and then last night she lost a second child, her two year old to meningitis. I can’t even begin to understand the depths of the pain in her soul.
Secondly, the story of Don Yoon who lost his wife, his baby daughter Grace (15 months), his baby daughter Rachel (2 months) and his mother-in-law in an instant when a US F-18 jet crashed into his house while he was at work. How can you measure that kind of loss? (Todd’s post led me to these this and this from Eugene Cho and here’s the news report)
Dong Yun Yoon to use his Korean name, is a Christian and has already chosen to forgive. Remarkable. Do pray.
Very strange this need to imitate the spiritual while removing all the substance. It can’t be good for a society to live in the shallow end of existence all the time.
“Depression can have a number of underlying causes – guilt, disappointment, trauma, bereavement, betrayal and so on. (Depression is sometimes linked to chemical imbalances in the brain, but medical science is unclear which is cause and which is effect. In my experience and the experience of others pastors to whom I’ve talked, chemical imbalances are never the only cause. You have to remember that medical practitioners look at all problems in medical terms because that is what they are trained to deal with – they almost inevitably ignore the spiritual dimension.)”
Read the whole thing here
So right now we have moved my wife’s desk from the back hall into my office, plus some of our bedroom furniture so we have a little space in the bedroom for a cot. It’s very easy to grumble at times like this, when life isn’t ‘convenient’ or straight forward. But our blessings are without number and if our child arrives (hopefully in good health) our blessings will increase. We have been given so much that we lack for nothing on the baby front, and although we might improve things we actually lack for nothing materially in any other way either. Therefore despite the ‘inconvenience’ we are content.
I wasn’t going to blog on this, but instead ask the question, which books are absolutely critical for preaching and leading? It will be interesting to see as I strip away all the vast number of books, whether it means I actually spend more time in the Bible and more time before God seeking the right way of communicating the message. This ‘inconvenience’ could turn into another blessing…
So what can we do to be a part of something that liberates creation from its bondage to decay? Small things like this idea for book addicts like me. I’ve been mulling over what we could do as a household to change our lifestyle habits to better respond to the challenges creation faces. Aiming for zero landfill waste, might be the thing. Which with child number one on the way will be a challenge.
Recent changes include signing up to a new energy tariff – Betterplan from SSE, that rewards customers for consuming less. I now have an energy monitor that shows changes in energy consumption. It’s both cool and disturbing to see how much energy the kettle requires…and how much it costs. We’re composting, recycling more than ever and we’re about to begin growing some of our own veg.
If I remember I’ll write something on parenting, because it strikes me that if I don’t learn how to live more sustainably then my children won’t either and what I’ll do is raise more people who consume at levels the planet can’t afford. So perhaps the most profound thing I can do is to raise environmentally aware kids!
I am exhausted after another amazing day! We began with worship led by Gareth LeLong-McKean, where again we really sensed God’s presence with us. Plus teaching from myself and Terry Hotchkiss on how God could use even a single conversation to change someone’s destiny. Stirring stuff.
As you can see Remarriage After Divorce in Today’s Church has little to do with my normal subject! It’s not a subject that really concerns people outside of the church except when it happens to them, especially when they realise how costly it is! The Counterpoints series from Zondervan is really excellent placing as it does differing views alongside each other and allowing room for response and comment from the contributors. It’s extremely helpful in working out what you think on a subject. Hopefully they’ll do one on giving or money one day.
Wenham takes the ‘no remarriage after divorce’ view, Heth the ‘limited exceptions’ and Keener ‘the wider exceptions’ view. Wenham makes some good points but I find myself in greatest agreement with Heth and Keener. If understanding what the Bible teaches about such a crucial pastoral subject is of interest to you then I recommend it.
I believe Jesus when he said 'life does not consist in the abundance of our possessions'. I believe he offers something better. This blog is mostly about that search.
I'm also a husband, a father, church planter, keen runner, reader, and motorcyclist. These and a few other things make guest appearances from time to time.
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