Category Archives: Children

To Love… or Not?

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When a new baby comes to a family, preschool siblings are curious, wanting to touch, kiss, hold, and interact with this novel and interesting little bundle. Cameras click and parents are thrilled with the initial enthusiasm. But after several weeks, even the littlest big brother or sister begins to catch on.

Baby-cakes isn’t going away.

As a matter of fact, by taking up permanent residency, the baby has caused older siblings to be demoted. This new little person takes over Mommy completely and seems to be the only thing on her mind: “Talk quietly… Baby’s sleeping… Touch gently… That’s enough for now… Be careful…”

Mommy and Daddy ask, “Isn’t the baby wonderful?” while older children think, “How can we get rid of it.”

The children quickly learn the only way to stay on everybody’s good side is to fake a love for the baby, which most toddlers and preschoolers do well, at least for a while. Their heart isn’t in it, though, evidenced by kisses accompanied by too-tight squeezes and pats that closely resemble hits.

If we’re honest, we have to say that sometimes we view God in a similar way, as an intrusion in our lives. We know the relationship should be one of genuine love and devotion, but accepting him as he is can often feel like heavy pressure.

So we approach him in prayer and say the right words, but our hearts aren’t in it. We sit in church pretending to listen but sneak frequent peeks at our watches. We attend Bible study but tune out when we recognize what’s being taught and think we already know it.

Believers sometimes go through periods of complacency during which they feel far from God. Since he doesn’t leave us, the estrangement must be on our part. That doesn’t stop us from blaming him, however, if our prayers seem unheard and our spiritual vitality grows parched.

When a new baby arrives, parents insist the other children accept him, but God isn’t like that. He doesn’t force us to do anything we don’t want to do and won’t come into our lives at all unless personally invited. That means there’s no valid reason to feel negatively toward him. If we want him, he says we can have him, and if we don’t, we shouldn’t complain about being without him.

The Lord is always honest with us and wants us to be the same with him. It’s a relief to know there’s no need for pretense or for faking love. We aren’t preschoolers trying to act as if we adore a new baby. We’re grown-ups, and it’s up to us whether or not we want to love God.

And if we decide to love him, I’m fairly sure there’s no way to overdo it.

“There is no God like you in all of heaven above or on the earth below. You keep your covenant and show unfailing love to all who walk before you in wholehearted devotion.” (1 Kings 8:23)

 

Chatterbox

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My 3rd grandchild was born 3 months after my husband died. Although Nate knew about the baby’s approaching birth, he never got the chance to meet him. He sure would have gotten a kick out of this little guy though, because Micah holds his own in conversations with adults. Although he’s only two, he’s a regular raconteur.

Tonight was a perfect example. After returning from an afternoon at the beach, Micah and I took a fussy baby Autumn on a walk while their parents organized dinner. I pushed the stroller, and Micah maneuvered a pint-sized scooter as we moved down the quiet road chatting about life.

Micah: Looka dat bike. Two seats! Dat bike has two seats. It has two seats.

Me (cutting in while he’s still talking): Two people can ride together.

Micah: Yeah, two people ride together. They ride together. Two people ride. Dat bike has two seats. It has two seats.

Me (again interrupting): You’re good with that scooter, Micah. You know how to do it.

Micah: Yeah, I’m good wit dat scooter. I’m a good scooter. I’m good. I got a scooter. Sissy got a scooter. It’s Sissy’s scooter. A good scooter. I’m a good scooter.

On and on we conversed, though 95% of the words belonged to him, as if he was on a radio broadcast wanting to fill dead air. While little Autumn cooed at passing trees, the 3 of us walked the neighborhood for 45 minutes, and Micah never once stopped talking.

There’s a parallel here between God and me. Often I start our chats with a “Dear Father…” and don’t stop talking until the “Amen.” It might be 5 minutes or 55, but it’s always yak yak yak. Requests aside, does this sort of lopsided conversation do anything for our relationship? Maybe it’s an example of Ecclesiastes 6:11: “The more the words, the less the meaning.”

But I don’t think so.

I absolutely love it when Micah talks to me. I watch the expressions on his pudgy face, his little boy mouth struggling for words, the hand motions making a point. And when he’s back in Florida, I’ll miss our chats a great deal. But what I’ve just realized is that it’s not really the talking I’ll miss. It’s the talker. And I’m fairly confident it’s much the same with God and me.

No matter what goofy things I say to him, no matter how I struggle with the words, no matter how unbalanced the dialogue, his love for the one doing the non-stop talking is stronger than his love of the conversation.

Sure, he probably wants me to listen more than I do and meditate on what he’s already told me. But when he said he would always love me, he didn’t add, “…unless you talk too much.”

I’ll never stop telling him I’m really happy about that!

“A king wants to hear the truth and will favor those who speak it.” (Proverbs 16:13)

Poisons that Kill

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Modern medicine is a good thing, and part of that is the use of effective drugs. Misuse, however, can get us into trouble.

When my husband’s cancer was rushing through his system, our drug use became prodigious. (“Medicine 101”) Those of us helping him were in a race to stay ahead of his escalating symptoms, and because pancreatic cancer is 100% fatal, we weren’t under the delusion Nate’s prescriptions would heal him. The pills were simply meant to ease his misery: Vicodin, Oxycontin, Ondansetron, Morphine, and others.

During 5 of Nate’s 6 weeks of cancer, he took the pills himself (though we handed them to him), but during the last week, everything changed. He had trouble holding onto the small pills, and sometimes they’d roll off his fingers on the way to his mouth. When that happened, we’d get on all fours around his chair in an effort to find the stray drug. With two young children in the house, one a crawler, our mission to keep an eye on each pill was critical.

One day we lost an oxicontin, the strength of which could kill a toddler. All of us endeavored to find it, literally inspecting every square inch near where Nate had last held it in his hand. We swept, vacuumed, and inspected the vacuum bag contents but failed to find the pill. And until my grandchildren left several weeks later, we lived with uncertainty and a good deal of fear.

All of our lives include scenarios that can turn out to be harmless or deadly. For example, it isn’t difficult to prevent a child from eating moldy food or a friend from running in front of a truck. But what about the out-of-sight dangers like hanging onto unforgiveness or letting anger dominate? Do we tolerate jealousy or let worry control us? Or how about allowing fear to consume us or nurturing our anger? Maybe we have a critical spirit or are permitting bitterness to take root.

Are we as diligent about locating these things in our lives as we might be in searching for a stray Oxycontin pill? If not, it’s probably because we think of hidden poisons as insipid rather than insidious, despite their ability to destroy us just as effectively as a drug overdose or a deadly cancer.

Scripture warns us to watch for these inner poisons, label them honestly, and route them out. And in the empty places they leave behind, God promises to put something new, something good, because he’s not a God of emptiness but of fullness.

As for the wayward Oxycontin pill? A month after my grandchildren left I was brushing dog hair from a heating grate when there it was, nestled snugly against the white grill. How we missed it I’ll never know, but once found, it was thoroughly destroyed.

“The church… is made full and complete by Christ, who fills all things everywhere with himself.” (Ephesians 1:23)