Children's Ministry Moment No. 451
I go to church twice every Sunday. No, really. First I go to the 9 AM service and learn from my toddlers. Then I go to the 11:30 AM service with my family and learn from the preacher.
Today was full of moments. My half-asian toddler, Ty, was in about the worst mood a child of extreme intelligence can contract: he was bored. Original sin is definitely inherent in two-year-olds. And, it occured to me a few weeks ago, in my children's ministry class I am outnumbered by unbelievers.
It helps that they are two-year-olds.
Ty went after every other child's sippy cup, on purpose. He employed his escape artist skills to the max, and even managed to squeeze around the wall partition at one point. I'm convinced that that child belongs in the CIA.
He's also wonderful. We had a game of tickle-me that left us both gasping, and I think I got more real and simple pleasure out of that one game than I have out of months of more sophisticated entertainments such as movies, intellectual conversation, and concerts or plays. The secret to staying young is to stay with the young, and play with them, and quite literally become as a little child.
I was little-childed today.
But anyway, on to Moment No. 451. Today's lesson took me rather by surprise. I was watching the children, thinking of nothing in particular, when the thought suddenly drifted across my mind: "Parenting can't be about total devotion to your children. If it were, then your children would have nothing to which to devote themselves."
All in a flash, I realized that I have had a wrong idea about parenting for lo these many years. I have been thinking that parenting necessarily means that you live for your children, and only for them. But if you do that---if you give nothing of yourself to other people around you, to service in your church community, to the continued improvement of relationships both with God and with other people (husband, friends, even perfect strangers), then your child will have nowhere to go, because you have made him the center, and have given him no other focus point.
It was quite a revelation. I had somehow thought, in my naivete, that parenthood meant being free to give all one's energies to the nurturing of a small person. And though that's true in one way, it is much more importantly true in another that this small person needs something to grow towards. Thus a parent must not neglect the Gospel for their child, or else the child will not reach for the Gospel. Children copy their parents in everything, quite unconsciously. I wouldn't want my child to copy me by making himself the center of his small world.
This insight shook me and left me profoundly glad that I am not yet a parent. If I had a three-year-old by now (which is possible, early marriage being a trend among homeschoolers), and if my husband had not the wisdom to correct my faulty ideas, or if I had not had the humility to listen to him, what incalculable harm might I have done by now?
And how many other wrong conceptions of parenthood are floating about in my subconscious even as I write this?
These are sobering thoughts, but not utterly bleak ones. After all, God gives grace for today, not tomorrow. If I had had children yesterday, I am sure there would have been insights granted then. Nevertheless, this whole train of thought did have one very salutary effect: it humbled me. Once more I find how limited, how unconsciously foolish, are my own ideas about life and godliness. Once more, I resolve to walk before God with fear and trembling, aware of the awesome mysteries that surround me, brush me, and go on into eternity.
Today was full of moments. My half-asian toddler, Ty, was in about the worst mood a child of extreme intelligence can contract: he was bored. Original sin is definitely inherent in two-year-olds. And, it occured to me a few weeks ago, in my children's ministry class I am outnumbered by unbelievers.
It helps that they are two-year-olds.
Ty went after every other child's sippy cup, on purpose. He employed his escape artist skills to the max, and even managed to squeeze around the wall partition at one point. I'm convinced that that child belongs in the CIA.
He's also wonderful. We had a game of tickle-me that left us both gasping, and I think I got more real and simple pleasure out of that one game than I have out of months of more sophisticated entertainments such as movies, intellectual conversation, and concerts or plays. The secret to staying young is to stay with the young, and play with them, and quite literally become as a little child.
I was little-childed today.
But anyway, on to Moment No. 451. Today's lesson took me rather by surprise. I was watching the children, thinking of nothing in particular, when the thought suddenly drifted across my mind: "Parenting can't be about total devotion to your children. If it were, then your children would have nothing to which to devote themselves."
All in a flash, I realized that I have had a wrong idea about parenting for lo these many years. I have been thinking that parenting necessarily means that you live for your children, and only for them. But if you do that---if you give nothing of yourself to other people around you, to service in your church community, to the continued improvement of relationships both with God and with other people (husband, friends, even perfect strangers), then your child will have nowhere to go, because you have made him the center, and have given him no other focus point.
It was quite a revelation. I had somehow thought, in my naivete, that parenthood meant being free to give all one's energies to the nurturing of a small person. And though that's true in one way, it is much more importantly true in another that this small person needs something to grow towards. Thus a parent must not neglect the Gospel for their child, or else the child will not reach for the Gospel. Children copy their parents in everything, quite unconsciously. I wouldn't want my child to copy me by making himself the center of his small world.
This insight shook me and left me profoundly glad that I am not yet a parent. If I had a three-year-old by now (which is possible, early marriage being a trend among homeschoolers), and if my husband had not the wisdom to correct my faulty ideas, or if I had not had the humility to listen to him, what incalculable harm might I have done by now?
And how many other wrong conceptions of parenthood are floating about in my subconscious even as I write this?
These are sobering thoughts, but not utterly bleak ones. After all, God gives grace for today, not tomorrow. If I had had children yesterday, I am sure there would have been insights granted then. Nevertheless, this whole train of thought did have one very salutary effect: it humbled me. Once more I find how limited, how unconsciously foolish, are my own ideas about life and godliness. Once more, I resolve to walk before God with fear and trembling, aware of the awesome mysteries that surround me, brush me, and go on into eternity.
posted by Praelucor at 7:23 PM
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