A Tribute to Fatherhood

Yesterday Kathleen and I attended the funeral of a longstanding friend, Al Hill. During our trip home, we pondered his life as it informed the term, fatherhood.

It was evident that Al had a large circle of friends; the church was packed. He had also distinguished himself as a churchman and educator. Yet, it was his success as a father that lingered with us.

It was obvious that Al and Grace had raised three stalwart sons, all now in stable marriages with children to bless them and their grandparents. All this stayed with us as we drove.

One son’s tribute stood out. He said that his father had insisted that under all circumstances he and his two brothers respect their mother. The point was made repeatedly while they were growing up. The three boys were apparently reminded even in adulthood to “look after your mother.”

This reminded me of an episode with one of my own sons who in early adolescence had begun to show moments of veiled disrespect for his mother. I spoke to him about it. “She is not only your mother,” I told him sternly, “she is my wife, and I insist that my wife be respected.” The message given in that novel way registered. Today, this son and my other two children could not be more loving and solicitous of their mother’s well being.

Fatherhood should be more elevated in our world than it is for a variety of reasons: it is a divinely ordained assignment, a role deeply rooted in history, a widely-used positive metaphor, an honorable title, an art, a crucial social role — and a joy.

I will remember Al for his churchmanship. I will remember him for his good ideas. I will never forget the favor he did for our family when, as a school principal, he facilitated our daughter’s return to Canada to teach.

But, after the tributes we heard yesterday, I will honor him foremost in my memory for the way he embraced fatherhood as a sacred trust. And he did it well.

(More next week.)

To e-mail this post to a friend click here.

Raising Kids for Christ

I have now had the pleasure of observing from their earliest years the traits first of children, then grandchildren, and now great-grandchildren. I’ve noticed that if you observe carefully you can see their dispositional tendencies from the start.

Before they can talk or even walk they show on their faces and by their responses their reactions to people and life in general. And those traits tend to carry over to some degree when they arrive on the shores of adulthood.

One child has a sunny disposition from the start; another is unusually shy around all but close relatives. One child is full of self-confidence; another takes considerable encouragement to embrace new challenges. One tends to be defiant against all orders; another is easier to convince to go along. They all seem to share to one degree or another the ability to manipulate, to deceive, even that wretched impulse to punish parents who are supposed to regulate their lives. Likewise, they all at times have flashes of loving generosity toward parents.

If I could run my life back two generations to the time when our children were small I know I would study each one separately much more carefully than I did. I see even now how different they were in temperament.

I’m not a trained psychologist but I have gleaned from my child-raising experiences one truth that I find myself repeating over and over again. It’s that every child comes into the world with a “package,” one that their parents have to work with. They do not come as a blank sheet to be written on.

In the Bible, Esau was an outdoors type; Jacob was more for the indoor life. Esau was a man of appetite in the moment; Jacob was a cunning trader who could hold for the long view. But they were twins, both from the same mother and father. Each came into the world with his own package.

As our children were growing up, my wife, Kathleen, and I tended to pool our insights regarding how we would handle difficult situations. We had slightly different perspectives on what to do, and that was good. In fact, God made us to bring a male and female perspective to a parenting situation. But because of our shared values we agreed fully on the outcomes we were working and praying for.

We wanted our children to know Christ as we have known him. And character-wise we wanted them to be honest, respectful, obedient, and accountable to us even as they matured and went farther afield.

It pleased us to see them become resourceful and enterprising as they grew up. Perhaps some of this came from parental example and encouragement, but I think a fair portion of it came from the genes. They hustled and got their own odd jobs, saved their money, and bought some of their own clothes, or a bicycle, or fish tanks, or other things they were left to themselves to provide.

They were not without their squabbles. For siblings, fighting for territorial rights and jockeying for favor go with the territory. Sometimes it was tiring to us as it is for all involved parents. Those issues seemed to recede with the coming of adulthood and the children became staunch supporters of one another. And when they bring their spouses home, the mutual support among them all is a joy to see.

I feel for young parents who are bringing children up in today’s environment. There are so many external anti-family lures to contend with -– sitcoms in living color, often with subtle anti-Christian biases, cell phones, the whole perilous world of the Internet, texting (and sexting), early access to automobiles, a movie industry that can’t always be monitored, and even some educational influences in school that contradict family values.

Yet, I believe when properly administered, good family influences are stronger than all the counter influences. What are some of the things parents can do to increase the likelihood of winning the children to Christ and to adopt family values? Here are nine:

(1) Read the Bible and pray with them daily. Make it a family time.

(2) Take them to a church regularly where the preaching is biblical, clear, and anointed and leads to the growth of community.

(3) Make sure you attend a church where Christian Education for all ages is taken seriously and encourages discussion.

(4) Keep alert to the friends they choose. Invite them into your home.

(5) Don’t be shy about keeping track of what they are seeing and doing on the Internet; you are their guardians.

(6) Have fun times with them on their level.

(7) Take them for a treat occasionally one-on-one. In this case, it will not be the size of the treat that counts, it will be the exclusive attention of a parent.

(8) Be sure they get to Christian camps where their activities are properly supervised and they are invited to give their lives to Christ or to follow him.

(9) Model consistency before them and when you come short acknowledge it. Children respect honesty.

In my opinion, parents today tend not to reckon with a child’s free will as they should. They should make much of it when parenting, rather than considering themselves totally responsible for outcomes. By the time children are 15 they have made scads of choices that are rapidly shaping who they are becoming and what value system they will live by. Lying, cheating, stealing, sassing, rebelling –- these are all options open to them, however seriously their parents coach them in uprightness and decency and respect.

Children should therefore be held responsible for their choices. This needs to be brought home to them from their early years. I remember little sayings repeated to me in my childhood that infected me with a sense of personal responsibility from early years onward: “If you make your bed, you have to lie on it.” Or, “Your chickens will come home to roost.” Or, “Birds of a feather flock together.” Whenever I was unresponsive to parental advice regarding some decision, one such saying would be dropped into my memory and left with me to accept or reject. They were effective lines.

The battle for the souls of our children is a taxing one, but one well worth waging on every front -– the spiritual, the moral, the social. At the same time, every child must be helped to understand clearly that they are fully responsible for the decisions they make that seal their eternal destiny. The key decision: “What will you do with Jesus?”

To e-mail this post to a friend click here.

Thou Shalt Respect Thy Mother

Enough time has passed that the truth can now be told – with permission: I have a son who was gifted with words from his earliest years, but when adolescence arrived, a hurtful side of that gift manifested itself.

It wasn’t that he became openly rude or defiant. It was more that he showed an ability to sting with veiled scorn at the mention of something he didn’t agree with. This registered first as disrespect for his mother as a woman and a mother.

In response, my wife reminded me behind the scenes that she would not take disrespect from any of her children. This was not a negotiable issue. Her words were firm and heavy with emotion. I knew she expected me to go into action.

Soon after that exchange the veiled scorn appeared during an evening meal. It was directed toward something my wife had said. I interrupted the meal to march him to his bedroom where I delivered myself of a lecture that, though many years have passed, still strikes me as right.

First I let him know that the kind of disrespect he was showing would not be tolerated in our home. I delivered my message with conviction. This was a high intensity engagement.

Then came the key moment of our exchange. I explained that I might not be able to curb the disrespect he showed his mother within his one-on-one relationship to her. But I let him know that she was my wife and I would not tolerate any disrespect I witnessed or became aware of after the fact towards the woman I had pledged at the marriage altar “to love and to cherish.”

That appeared a new thought to him and the message sank in. There was genuine remorse. We ended the meeting kneeling side by side at his bed and engaging in a heartfelt prayer for God’s forgiveness and help. After all, it is God who decrees that children are to “Honor father and mother” — even though it is a father’s responsibility to enforce that commandment when it is violated.

I recall a similar situation a father of my acquaintance had with an obstreperous daughter. She was only four years of age but she was already using newly-acquired vocabulary and a sharp tongue to make life miserable at times for her mother. The father shared with me that he came home one day to a distraught wife who had received this unpleasant treatment off-and-on during the day

Upon learning this, he told me, he went into a drill of his own. Taking the little girl aside he confronted her with intensity, making sure she realized her conduct had ruined her mother’s day. She listened in tears. By the time the meeting was over that girl knew that her developing misconduct was out of bounds in that home. The father now tells me that that and other talks over her developing years were powerful in recruiting her own will to the task of respectful behavior.

I am aware of objections to my insistence that fathers have a special duty to enforce in children respect for their mothers. It may be that in some homes no father is present. Or that a father may be feared too harsh in dealing with such matters. Or that a step-father’s intervention might not be accepted, possibly making things worse.

I realize also that some may contend that a mother should have the skills to command the respect of growing children by herself without calling for a husband’s help.

But a father can do wonders by standing up relentlessly to protect the well-being of his wife when a child seems committed to destructive disrespect. In the process, he is likely also to win respect for himself and peace for the family.

Both of the above scenarios happened many years ago. Whatever became of those children? The son skilled with words is now the father of married children himself, and channels his gift with words into his lifetime work as a publisher and editor. I can witness that he could not be more solicitous of his mother’s well being. And he himself has raised a mutually respectful family.

Of the girl, now a working adult, her father tells me that her relationship with both parents is warm and collegial. I can bear witness from occasional personal contacts with that family that the cohesion and respect among all members of the family is a delight to behold.

I may be old-fashioned in my views about the father’s role in such situations. As I see it, he is to be the authority figure and thus if growing children show insolence or impudence toward their mother, he should carry primary responsibility to curb that misconduct.

My observations across a lifetime of ministry is that families benefit dramatically when a father takes responsibility to foster such respect – respect that goes both ways, child-to-parent and parent-to-child. Such families experience playfulness and mutual enjoyment in the good times, and “store up” sufficient goodwill to achieve recovery in times when someone falls momentarily “below the line.”

Blessed is the mother who has such a champion during the tough times when children are growing up. And blessed are the children who have built into their characters such standards of respect — for the pressing needs they will face in their own adulthood.

To e-mail this post to a friend click here.

A Fresh Wrinkle on Child-Rearing

Now here’s a fresh wrinkle on child-rearing, well worth posting in the literature.

Our friend and former parishioner, Melli, has spent much of her adult life in Burundi, Africa, along with her husband Ken. Together they’ve seen the enormous need of children left orphaned in great numbers there, and out of the compassion of their hearts have taken ten such children and are in the process of adopting the last six of them.

At the present, Melli is living in Lakeland, Florida with this little brood. They are in the United States principally for long term speech therapy for Samuel.

Melli writes that earlier that morning two of the children were squabbling over a little toy car and she was sure the whole neighborhood could hear the goings-on, So she commanded, STOP EVERYTHING AND QUOTE KING DAVID: “May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my strength and my redeemer” (Psalm 19:14)

She doesn’t report the results but I can guess that they were electric. And from the perspective of a great-grandfather, I can commend the solution to the literature and to the use of harried parents anywhere when their little ones squabble. Except that the children must be helped to memorize the prayer in advance of the strife.