Stories about Parents Number 1: A Tree for Lunch?

Being a kid's pastor, I get to see parents in all kinds of situations. Bad times: when a child brings home bad grade. Fun times: at a football game when their son scores a winning touchdown. Scary times: sitting with them in the hospital as a surgery is done. All sorts of different moments in kid's lives that I get to share with a family. With this being said, I get to see some pretty glaring moments of both good and bad parenting. Just because a parent has a bad parenting moment doesn't mean they are bad parents. It just means they made a choice that wasn't necessarily wise in the raising of their children. It is okay. We all have bone headed moments in parenting. I promise not to use any names in these stories, so don't worry no one will know except you and me and Margaret and your kids...and anyone else that was there that day. Well here goes the first installment of Stories about parents.

One time, I decided to host a family day at the Zoo with my preschool department at the church we were at. It was early spring. I thought we would have a great time. We got to the church to meet up and I remember being very disappointed at the turn out because only two families arrived to go with us. I didn't mind it just meant I got to go spend some quality time with those two families. This was before Marge and I had kids, so we were still establishing our own thoughts about parenting and how to raise our kids. Well little did we know when we showed up at this zoo day we were going to receive a huge lesson on parenting.

The two families we quickly find out are polar opposites of one another. We walk into the zoo to find family number one walking together, the parents pointing out different things in the welcome plaza like the fountain, and generally laid back. The other family was running, nearly jumping into the fountain and throwing temper tantrums about wanting to go into the gift shop. I was just trying to keep us moving.

We went to the chimp habitat. It was a beautiful. I asked the kids from family one some questions and they would answer me. The dad would look at his son and say, "shouldn't there be a sir on the end of that?" The 4 year old boy would look up at me and say, "sir". I thought, hey I am just a kid myself he doesn't need to call me sir. Now I understand that, his dad wanted him to understand at an early age that he need to show his pastor respect. The other set of kids would hug us and give me 5 but never was calling anyone sir a priority. When it came to their parents, I think they even called them by their first name a few times. Teaching respect was not a priority.

The glaring difference of respect not just for your pastor but for people in general became evident even more when it came lunch time. I remember sitting down outside at a table along a walk way with all the kids and parents starting to eat our sandwiches. Just behind the table was a line of trees that were used as shade. I was blown away, as I sat and talked with kids about their favorite animals we saw that morning. We were laughing and I didn't notice the Dad of the second family was no longer at the table with us. (That was my first mistake in all this, because I never should have let him out of my sight.) This grown man proceeds to climb up in a tree behind where we are eating. My back was to him so I didn't see him. I don't know if the kids were to preoccupied with eating or talking or both to notice that he was doing this. The next thing I know, We have tree branches in the middle of our table with him just cackling up a storm. I turned and really wanted to yell, "Idiot!" I didn't. I just took a deep breath and watched as their son sprinted right up to the tree and tried to do the same thing. He just lost all ability to tell him no he can't do that. He treated all of us and his kids with little respect as we were eating. Was it funny? Maybe to him. It was still pretty annoying to pull leaves out of my cheetohs. This was a true bone headed moment.

This is what I took away from that day. If I treat people my kids need to see in authority without respect then they will not respect their authority. And if you climb in a tree and drop branches into peoples table you look like a... well I'm sure you can insert a word there. Do we have to be like the first family and be so strict that any time someone asks you a question you have to say sir or keep your kids in a single file line from shortest to tallest as you walk? No. Do we need to find a balance of hey if I treat other people with respect myself then maybe my kids will too? That is more like a plan that I like. Parenting, like life, is about balance.

Be Real

But by shifting our focus from what we do to what God does, don't we cancel out all our careful keeping of the rules and ways God commanded? Not at all. What happens, in fact, is that by putting that entire way of life in its proper place, we confirm it. Romans 3: 31 (Message)

When I was younger, I worked for over 5 years at Office Depot both in the store and at a warehouse. It was a learning time for me. I had a call of God on my life to be doing full time ministry, but I needed to go through this to understand what life outside the walls of a church is like. A lady I worked with who was not a Christian and I were friends and talked regularly about life and struggles. We talked about my beliefs and her struggles with having any beliefs. I remember her telling me she had a hard time with pastors and their appearance of perfection. She would talk to me about how I was the first Christian she knew that she didn't feel threatened to share her own mistakes with. As a young pastor, I found it very interesting that it wasn't a form of perfection that someone in the world was looking for as a pastor. I think many times we think about struggles in our own lives and sins that we commit and we compress them so we don't look like the people we are trying to see saved, or just look like the world at all. She wanted someone that was real. She wanted someone that she could relate to, and not someone that was perfect or trying to appear perfect. I think everyone in the world (including nonbelievers) understands and believes Romans 3:23. Everyone knows that everyone messes up. I think many times we as Christians in our striving to achieve righteousness we forget that we are not righteous beings. I think our striving to pull off a perfect appearance creates a divide between pastors and not just the world but our own people.

I have to remind myself on a regular basis that people think less about me, than I think they think about me. When I begin to worry about what people think about me or what I do then I put up this wall of self righteousness that is neither truthful nor helpful. I think every person I pastor or run into on the street know that I make mistakes. They all know that I am a man. Am I trying each day to get better and become a closer reflection of the Christ that I follow? I hope so. I hope that my decisions show that I am getting closer to that. I have to remember that in the messages I give to kids and adults alike they see this process. I hope I never come off as someone who thinks he is perfect. I know I am not. I will always make mistakes because I am a sinful man. My hope is that by being transparent with my life people will still want to come to know Christ through my example. I know kids can tell the difference between someone who is real and someone who is faking it. Is your focus on worrying about what you do or is your focus on what Jesus did? Is it on what he is doing in your life?

Pleasing God

Yesterday was my son Cooper's birthday. He turned the big age of 6. Whoa! My wife asked him what he wanted for his big birthday meal. He sat and thought for a moment. He said green beans and meatballs with no sauce. Margaret and I have been on a diet for the last several weeks. One of the first nights on the diet, she fixed green beans and meatballs with no sauce. He liked it. Still, knowing my son, I knew that was not one of his favorite meals. So we made sure to make him understand, he could choose anything for dinner not just Mommy and Daddy's diet food. At that point he quickly changed his mind. We ate hot dogs, mac & cheese, and green beans with cookies for desert. I sat down and thought last night about this, and wondered about my son's love for his parents. He didn't go all selfish and crazy when we first asked him what he wanted for dinner. He knew the things we have been eating over the last several weeks to get healthy. He was willing to sacrifice his choice of a meal for us to continue our diets. Sometimes, I think when it comes to us as Christians we get to stuck on trying to do stuff to make God happy when in actual reality he just wants us to be happy.

Psalm 37:4 says Delight yourself in the Lord and, he will give you the desires of your heart. Basically, if you love God and do the right stuff then the things you want to do in this world will fall into place. I know people that will go around wondering about the perfect will of God. We think, maybe this thing I want to do just isn't what is going to make God happy, it isn't in his "perfect" will. Even though it is not sin nor is it something that could lead us down a road headed toward sin. Things that make us grow, things that help people, or things that are genuinely good God wants you to do if it is your desire. He just wants our worship. He just wants our faithfulness. He mostly wants our love. Cooper didn't think he had the option of picking fat foods because the previous few weeks our diets did not allow it. All I wanted for him was to have a great birthday meal. All God wants for us is to be happy. Cooper didn't need to please us, but his love for us made him want to. If we show God our love then he is going to give us the things that we want. It would probably surprise you how often that lines up.

Yesterday morning, I took my son, Cooper, to the driving range to hit a bucket of balls and practice putting. We'll do that periodically on my day off. We were having a great time. We always save a ball for each of us at the end and say, "Whoever hits their last ball the farthest that person has to buy drinks on the way home". He takes the ball and gives it a big swing and it will go basically down the hill. I will hit it and hopefully it goes farther than his. Then we pretend argue whose ball went the farther. We walk over to the putting area and putt for a little while. Right after we began putting Cooper looked at me and said, "Dad today I'm Tiger Woods". My heart sank.

He has never used Tiger as a person he wants to be or even someone who has made such poor life decisions as tiger as someone he would want to be. It is normal when we are watching or playing football for him (or any other boy) to say, "Hey I'm Tony Romo catch this pass"or "Throw me the ball Dad, I'm Jason Whitten". When we watch Nascar he says he want to be Jeff Gordon or Jimmy Johnson. When we are watching cartoons for him to say, "Dad, I want to be Superman". I have no problem with him saying those things. Those guys may not be living full on Christian witnessing lives, but they aren't all over the news being blasted about sex scandals. He couldn't pick a better golfer to be like.

Yes, Tiger is the best golfer that has lived and my son knows nothing about his life outside of golf. So, why should it bother me that he wants to be like him on the golf course? It's not like he is only picking out Christian people to be like. I guess that is why for me as a Dad I need to watch what I say and do even more. Yes, he may want to be like Tiger, Tony, or Jimmy on the golf course, football field, or race track. I have to make sure that I am the example he wants to be like at home, at work, or with his friends.

Thoughts on Social Networking

I was looking at my Facebook page earlier today. I was reading through people's status updates and liking and commenting on what people are doing. I even took a second to chat with someone. For a second, I thought, man I know more about my friends now than I ever have before. I know where my buddy Rusty is thinking about going to eat. I know what scripture other friends were reading today. I can tell what my other Pastor buddies are preaching about this weekend. It is great. The one thing I do wonder is, are we really connecting with others?

Of my 677 friends, maybe 50 to 100 of them I really ever message or talk to. Even with those, it is hit or miss. I sometimes find myself talking to other people and using a facebook status comment as a, I talked to him equivalent. Is it really? Making a funny comment on someone's status really should not be counted as talking to someone (even thought my Mother-n-law still doesn't understand the difference). Yeah, I know what my friends may be doing more often but I think we miss out on making an effort to check on people. I think we have officially figured out a way to get closer yet become farther away. The shallowness of reading status for many has replaced really getting to know people.

With that being said, I think I need to call a friend.

Goal Setting

Saturday morning, Margaret and I were laying in bed taking advantage of not having to be anywhere that morning. She had her Iphone out looking at facebook and telling me what people were putting down as their status. She saw that her parent's pastor's wife was running in a 5k race that morning. We started talking about what it would take to run in a 5k and that one of the girls that used to help us in kid's church had run in one. We decided that would be a great way for us to get in shape because we would have a goal before us. We have tried all kinds of stuff to get in shape. We joined a gym (we went until the kids school scheduling got in the way), we bought workout dvd's (The Carmen Electra one is still my favorite to watch), we tried wii workout games (that kicked my tail), and gave a try to a host of other failed bits. We never seemed to keep doing whatever we tried. Something always got in the way. It was kids or ministry or we were just to tired. Having a race to train for we thought would give us a goal to see the workouts through. I thought about being in High School and how I never had problems working out in the Summer because I knew football season was coming, I had a goal to aim for. We got online found a race and looked up workout plans. Margaret got up yesterday morning, early, to run. I took off and ran last night after the kids went to bed.

As I was walking at the end of my workout, I begin to think about how setting a goal is important in our lives. I think our relationships with Christ suffer because we forget about our goal. We may have stuff pop up in our day to day lives that effects the way we live for Christ because the other stuff is right there in front of us like our kids, our schedules, or just being tired. We forget about our goal, Heaven. I know this is borderline blasphemous, but I think Paul was wrong when he used our lives as a metaphor to a race. I wish he had used our lives as a metaphor to training for a race. When you train you can see the end in sight. When you train you set goals for yourself along the way. You work hard day in and day out. The race is our goal in preparing for a 5k, Heaven is our goal in this thing we call life. When I have Heaven squarely in my thoughts, I don't have a problem reading my word, praying, worshiping, or serving. It is when I worry about other stuff, the goals that are earthly that my priorities get messed up. Just as I can train for a race because I can see one coming, I can work on my relationship with Christ so much better if I can aim at that goal, Heaven.

I hope we never forget our goal in this life, even when the busyness has to be done. If we remember our goal, then it makes doing the truly important things a lot easier to accomplish.

Healthcare: my take

I sat up Sunday night watching CSpan. I don't think I have ever watched CSpan for more than 20 seconds at a time. I found myself just getting so frustrated at leaders that disagreed with my point of view. It was ridiculously frustrating. When congressmen that were on my side spoke, I found myself almost cheering them on. I understand the idea of helping people that can't afford healthcare. I understand creating laws to protect people from getting booted from their insurance because they are sick. My question is when did the job of helping the needy and taking care of the sick become the responsibility of the government. I always thought it was the job of the church. I know many churches have drastically decreased helping people for multiple reasons. People trying to take advantage of churches and the economy just to name a couple of them. How do we get back to the church being the place people go for help. I pray that God would give us the ability to get our churches back to a place of taking care of the needy and the sick. It may be the only way to save our nation.