The kitchen must be the favorite room in nearly every home.  It’s where the family meets to share their meals and their day, to gather important information—“Mom! Where are my good jeans?”—to pick up sustenance when the time between meals is long and the activities vigorous, and a place for sharing thoughts, dreams, and childhood troubles over chocolate chip cookies and ice cold milk.  When the kitchen is full of people and laughter, all is right with the world.

            That makes the kitchen floor a microcosm of how we all live.  All you have to do is drop something small, something that requires your face to be an inch above the floor trying to spy the odd shape or color, and suddenly you know everything anyone has eaten, spilled, or tracked in, even if you clean your floor regularly.  If I had every dustpan full of sweepings over my 38 years of marriage, it would make a ten foot pile high of sugar granules, flour, cornmeal, panko, cookie crumbs, Cheerios, oats, blueberries, chopped parsley, basil, and rosemary, the papery skins of onions and garlic cloves, freshly ground coffee beans, tiny, stray low dose aspirins, grains of driveway sand, clumps of garden soil, yellow clay, limerock, soot, and burnt wood, strands of hair from blonde to nearly black to gray and white, frayed threads, missing buttons, assorted screws, and loose snips from the edges of coupons.  If I had never cleaned the floor at all, it would be layered with coffee drips, dried splashes of dishwater, bacon grease and olive oil splatter, tea stains, grape juice, and sticky spots from honey and molasses spills while I was baking.  Put it all together and you would have a pretty good idea how we live our lives.

            Every soul has a kitchen floor, places where the accumulated spills of life gather.  We must regularly clean that floor, just as I am constantly sweeping and wiping and mopping, trying to stay ahead of the messes we make. As soon as I miss a day or a week, I have even more to clean up.  It would be ridiculous to think I could ignore that floor and no one would know about us, wouldn’t it? 

            Jesus said, “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks,” Matt 12:34.  You can deny it all you want, but what you speak shows who you really are.  I can say I never bake, but whoever sweeps my floor will know better.  I can pretend we don’t like Italian cuisine, but the evidence is right there.  I can tell everyone we live in the city instead of the country, but the soil on my floor will say otherwise.  It is getting harder for me to see those things now and to sweep them up perfectly, but my blindness to them will not keep others from knowing exactly what I do here all day long.

            That kitchen floor of a heart will tell on you too.  All you have to do is open your mouth.  If you don’t keep it cleaned up, if you don’t monitor the things you store in it, it could belie your protestations of a righteous life.  Sooner or later a word will slip out, a thought will take root and become a spoken idea.  I heard someone say once that you cannot imagine in others what is not already in your own heart. 

            Of course, what’s on your floor could prove your righteous life instead of denying it.  So take a moment today to examine your kitchen floor.  Let it remind you to examine your heart as well.  I had much rather people see sugar and cookie crumbs than Satan’s muddy footprints.
 
Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my rock and my redeemer, Psa 19:14.    
      
Dene Ward

I am certain that every Bible class teacher in the whole world has had this happen to them.  You reach a subject that you know applies to one or more people in your audience personally.  You know they need to hear this.  So you carefully lay it out in a way that cannot be missed or denied.

            Say you are teaching the story of Lydia and you reach that passage that seems innocuous, yet is anything but. 

            And after she was baptized, and her household as well, she urged us, saying, "If you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come to my house and stay." And she prevailed upon us, Acts 16:15.

            You know there is someone who regularly calls the preacher, deacons, and elders and tells them what they need, expecting everyone to be at their beck and call, or who takes them to task for not doing as much as she thinks they should (as if she were the only qualified judge of such things).  Meanwhile, this same person has yet to ever offer service to anyone else in the congregation.  Instead she judges the entire congregation on how well she is served. 

            So you make the point clearly:  Even a new Christian like Lydia, a brand new babe in Christ, could tell that her own faithfulness to the Lord was based on how often she served others, not on how often she was served by others.  And why shouldn’t it be, when the Lord she claimed to be serving was a servant himself?

            You hope to see the dawning light, and perhaps downcast eyes as that student realizes her error.  But no, there she is nodding vigorously, perhaps even saying, “Exactly!”  Your heart sinks because you know your efforts were in vain.  Instead of examining herself, she is still examining the church.  She is thinking, “Those people needed this, because they don’t serve like they should.”

            It doesn’t matter the subject.  It probably happens in every class and with every sermon in every church.  Meanwhile, the folks who knock themselves out trying to be what the Lord expects them to be sit there wondering, “Do I do enough?”

            So here is the thought for this morning.  Stop judging everyone else.  Think about yourself, for this is one area where it is not only allowed to be a little egocentric, but required.  Don’t say, “They needed that.”  Instead, say, “I needed that.  Now how can I get better?” 

            Whatever the subject, even if you think it has absolutely nothing to do with you or your life, think about yourself.  It is not my business to fix everyone else; it is only my business to fix myself.  It is not my business to decide what everyone else needs to do; it is only my business to realize what I need to do.  I must constantly ask myself, Did I need that?  I know I did, somehow, even if it is not yet obvious to me.  That only means I need to look harder. 

            Every lesson I hear, every sermon I listen to, should have me thinking, “How can I use this to become a better disciple of my Lord?”
 
They began to be sorrowful and to say to him one after another, "Is it I?"  Mark 14:19.
 
Dene Ward

I did not watch any television to speak of for about twenty years.  A few football games here and there, and a couple of educational shows while the children were small meant that I knew more Sesame Street characters than characters on any of the popular series.   I suppose the last shows I remembered well before then were the original Star Trek, Mission: Impossible, and Hawaii Five-O.

            A few years ago I turned on some show—I don’t even remember what is was—and I nearly went crazy.  The scene shifted every thirty seconds.  You no longer had dialogue that built dramatic tension over a five minute time span.  Instead you had 15 seconds of verbal staccato followed by an explosion or a gunfight or a chase scene.  They tell me this is all because of the video game generation—people who cannot sit still longer than a minute at a time without some sort of excitement to keep the adrenaline pumping.  Maybe I am an old fogy, but it seems to me that instead of accommodating all of this, we should be teaching people how to overcome it. 

            The problem with short attention spans is that you do not listen long enough to get below the subject’s surface.  God spent 1500 years writing a book that you cannot read and understand in fifteen second bursts.  He has already accommodated us with an incredible sacrifice.  Seems to me we could learn to accommodate him and the way he communicates with us.

            Parents, have you even thought about helping your children develop a longer attention span and a desire for greater depth in their studies?  Instead of saying, “He just can’t sit still,” how about saying, “Sit still!”  Instead of saying, “I can’t get them to listen,” say, “Listen!  This is important!”  Or don’t we believe it is? 

            Yes, I know all about ADHD.  I have a son who has it.  The doctor said that the reason he was so well-behaved and did so well in school in spite of it was because he had a verbal, educated family that believed in loving discipline.  Was it easy? No, but no one ever said parenting was supposed to be.  It takes patience and diligence—a long parental attention span!

            It isn’t merely my idea of what does and does not constitute good behavior.  I worry about children who cannot sit still long enough to learn a Bible lesson and the accompanying applications to their lives; who cannot concentrate long enough to memorize a verse that might help them in a tempting moment; who actually think the world revolves around them and needs to run on their frenetic schedule with a lot of excitement or it isn’t worth their notice.  Keith has a lot of them sit across the desk from him in the prison—they usually have manacles on.

            How do you think Moses managed 40 days of taking dictation from God on Mt. Sinai?  How did Joshua abide the boredom of marching around Jericho everyday for six days, much less seven times on the seventh?  How could Paul have fasted and prayed for three days straight without needing to get up and run around for awhile?  How could those early churches sit and listen to an entire epistle being read to them at one sitting, and actually make heads or tails of it?  How in the world did Noah spend 120 years building a giant box no one had ever seen before and couldn’t imagine the need for?  Would any of this generation be able to?

            Prayer requires long quiet moments with God.  Meditation requires thoughtful time with the word of God.  Commitment requires a lifetime of doing what needs to be done even when it is tedious and you don’t want to do it.  Help your children learn those things.  Don’t give in to yet another method for Satan to steal them away from us.
 
So Ezra the priest brought the Law before the assembly, both men and women and all who could understand what they heard, on the first day of the seventh month. And he read from it facing the square before the Water Gate from early morning until midday, in the presence of the men and the women and those who could understand. And the ears of all the people were attentive to the Book of the Law. Neh 8:2,3.                        
 
Dene Ward

I walked into the kitchen and stopped, looking around at the counters, the stove top, the sink, the pantry. 

              Keith came in behind me and asked, “What are you looking for?”

              “I don’t know,” I said. “I can’t remember,” and nothing lying around in plain view had jogged that memory, one that couldn’t have been over a minute old.  I have finally reached that stage when my memory is as fragile as my old lady bones.

              My short term memory, that is.  My memories of childhood, school, early marriage, and raising kids are firmly intact, and so are the memory verses I learned decades ago as a child.

              For a while there, memory verses seemed to be out of style.  I even heard a sister in Christ say their value was “overrated.”  She was even older than I.  I wonder how she feels now, especially during long nights when she can’t sleep, as happens so often to the elderly.

              Those memorized verses are invaluable to me.  They instantly spring to mind when I await another scary test result (“casting all your cares on him because he cares for you” 1 Pet 5:7); when the aches and pains of old age slow you down and you can no longer do what you have always done (“For this perishable body must put on the imperishable” 1 Cor 15:53); when friends and family pass on before you leaving a hole no one else can fill (“That you may not grieve as those who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep” 1 Thes 4:13,14); when you suddenly realize you’ve reached an age where anything could happen any time (“Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord” Rev 14:13).

              All my life during times of temptation, suffering, and betrayal, but also joy, hope and thanksgiving, those passages memorized so long ago have kept me going.  They’ve helped me answer a skeptic, refute false teaching, encourage a suffering friend, and edify my sisters in Christ.  Those words etched on the hearts of your children are anything but overrated.  Fill them up now, and while you’re at it, fill yourself up before your memory, too, becomes as fragile as your bones.
 
“You shall therefore lay up these words of mine in your heart and in your soul, and you shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall teach them to your children, talking of them when you are sitting in your house, and when you are walking by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates, Deut 11:18-20
Dene Ward

I know—if you are not a musician you don’t know what I am talking about, but it really is 101—basic and easy.

            “Diatonic” means “two tones.”  A diatonic scale is made up of two kinds of tones—whole tones and semitones, or more commonly, whole steps and half steps.  As Occidentals, the diatonic scale is the most pleasing tone to our ear.  Try using a scale of only whole steps and it will set your teeth on edge.  My students used to call it “outer space music.”  Try making music with a half step scale and it will sound like you’ve let a hive of bumblebees loose in the room.  The point is, it takes two kinds of steps to make pleasant music.

            As humans we have a tendency to see “two kinds” in practically every situation and to do our best to make it NOT work.  In the early church when everyone was Jewish, they still managed to make a distinction between Jews born in Palestine and those born elsewhere (Acts 6).  Once Gentiles were converted, the distinction was circumcision (Acts 15).  If that weren’t enough, the bias became wealth (James 2), and then the full blown heresy of Gnosticism (1 John)—those who “knew” things others did not.

            “You’re not like us so you don’t belong,” was the attitude.  “Change or leave,” was often unspoken but surely intended, and if change was not possible, then leaving was the obvious “choice.”

            Paul spent several chapters in several epistles reminding us that while we are to repent (change) from a life of sin, no other change was required.  In fact, our differences make us a stronger, better body.

            But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. If all were a single member, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, yet one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, "I have no need of you," nor again the head to the feet, "I have no need of you."…But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. 1 Cor 12:18-21,24,25.

            What I cannot do, maybe you can.  What you can’t, maybe I or someone else can.  Every ability is important and thus every person.  In fact, we have a tendency to judge differently than God does in that area.  As we have noted before, it was a woman who sewed for the poor whom Peter raised from the dead (Act 9), not the martyred preacher deacon (Acts 7) or apostle and cousin of the Lord (Acts 12).

            God expects us to live together, love together, and work together in harmony.  Rich and poor, Jew and Gentile, black and white, we are to make beautiful diatonic music together, not segregate ourselves into uniform groups that can only make weird sounds, sounds only fit for aliens, and not for the friends and neighbors we hope to save.
 
For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus, Gal 3:27,28.
 
Dene Ward

Today's post is by guest writer Lucas Ward.

Ty Cobb is my favorite historical baseball player. Reading the new biography of him by Charles Leerhsen, Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty, has confirmed this. When he retired from baseball, Cobb held ninety (90!) Major League records. When we think of him today, we primarily think of his hitting with good reason, as he still holds the career record for batting average at .366, the record for consecutive league batting titles at nine, and the record for most consecutive seasons batting at least .300 at an amazing 23. There have been over 100,000 men who have played baseball in the Major Leagues since 1900 but only two, Peter Rose and Ty Cobb, have over 4,000 hits.

So, Cobb was a great contact hitter, but what he was most known for in his day (1905-1928) was his base running. He not only set the record for most stolen bases, he also routinely kept running when all others would have stopped, makings singles into doubles and doubles into triples. He would tag up and take the next base on in-field popups and steal when the fielder threw the ball back to the pitcher. Jackie Robinson became famous partly for stealing home plate. He did it 19 times in his career. Cobb took home 54 times. My favorite Cobb story involves an inside-the-park home run that never left the infield. There was a man on third when Cobb hit a little dribbler. The runner assumed that the fielders would throw to first and tried to take home. Unfortunately for him, they threw to the catcher at home and caught him in a run-down. While he was darting back and forth between home and third with most of the other team chasing after him, no one notices that Cobb has kept rounding the bases. As they finally tagged the runner out near third base, Cobb was just passing third and headed for home. The opposing team was so agape at his chutzpah that no one thought to throw to home, and Cobb scored. You never knew what he was going to do, which was part of his plan. He intentionally tried to get into the heads of the opposing team. It has been said that if they kept records on causing poor, panicked throws Cobb would own that record too. In fact, a contemporary catcher, Ray Schalk, said “When Cobb is on first base and he breaks for second, the best thing you can do, really, is to throw to third.” When Cobb, who played for the Detroit Tigers, was roaming the bases, the other team needed to pay attention or he’d make them look silly.

So, Cobb was a Tiger prowling the bases trying to disrupt the other team. Please tell me you are already turning your Bibles to 1 Peter 5. 1 Pet. 5:8-9 “Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world.” Like Cobb, Satan is roaming around trying to get us. Like the opposing baseball team, we are never sure exactly what Satan will throw at us next and we have to keep watch constantly. Unlike Cobb, who was trying to destroy confidence and win a baseball game, Satan’s is trying to destroy our souls and send us to Hell. We must be watchful. We must be aware. Satan’s “batting average” is unfortunately high. We are promised, however, that we can resist him. If we do, he will flee (James 4:7). That’s something Ty Cobb never did.

Lucas Ward

Today is a day for lovers, or so the merchandisers of the world say.  Do Keith and I do anything special?  You better believe it.  It’s usually nothing huge—a card, a homemade gift, a bouquet of handpicked wildflowers, a special dessert.  We don’t try to single-handedly support Madison Avenue.  Sometimes Keith simply takes the day off and we spend time together talking—what a novel idea, especially for some married folks!  Not because we celebrate some Catholic “saint” or because we feel pressured by society, but because we take every opportunity to revel in our love.  How do you think we have managed to put up with each other for all these years?

            Romance is not an un-Biblical concept.  While the description of the body in several passages in the Song of Solomon may not appeal to our Western ears, it is still used in the courtship rituals of some Eastern countries today.  The Proverb writer speaks of romance like this: There are three things which are too wonderful for me, yes, four which I do not understand:  the way of an eagle in the air, the way of a serpent upon a rock, the way of a ship in the middle of the sea, and the way of a man with a maid, 30:18-20. 

            The writer of Ecclesiastes tells us to live joyfully with the wife whom you love all the days of your life of vanity, which he has given you under the sun…for that is your portion in life, 9:9.  “Live joyfully” is an injunction; it is not passive.  Do not wait for it; initiate it yourself.  These passages were originally spoken to couples whose marriages were arranged.  Imagine what God expects of those of us who chose our own spouses after “falling in love.” 

            Two or three times a week as I clean out Keith’s lunchbox in the evening, I find red, heart-shaped love notes he has cut out of some office scrap paper and written—I know he has taken time out of a busy day to think of me.  And he usually calls during his lunch hour.

            Eating a nice dinner out is in our budget only a couple of times a year—and that is up from the early days of our marriage--but I can make a four course meal for two for the price of one entrée in an upscale restaurant, and enjoy doing it. Several times a year, we dress up, get out the china, light the candles, and have a meal I have worked on all day.  When the boys were little, I fixed them their own special meal—more along the lines of pizza than boeuf bourguignon--then explained how they could help mommy and daddy have a special time together by going to bed early, and staying there.  Besides the reward of their favorite meal, they could stay up late reading and talking to one another.  We occasionally heard thumps and giggles long after we would have ordinarily put a stop to it, but never once did they not fulfill their part of the bargain by interrupting us because we stressed to them how important their part was and they were thrilled to do it. 

            Marriage is a high maintenance relationship.  If you neglect it, it goes downhill in a hurry.  Do something today, no matter how small it may be—and whether or not the other one reciprocates--to keep that from happening.  Make sure it is something that will mean something to your spouse, not just to you!  Men and women are different that way (as if you hadn’t noticed).  Then choose another time to do it again—not just your anniversary or Valentine’s Day.  Do it sometimes for no good reason at all. Or isn’t keeping your marriage alive reason enough? 

            God expects you to romance one another.
 
Drink waters out of your own cistern, and running waters out of your own well.  Should your springs be dispersed abroad, and streams of water in the streets?  Let them be for yourself alone, and not for strangers with you.  Let your fountain be blessed and rejoice in the wife of your youth.  As a loving hind and a pleasant doe, let her breasts satisfy you at all times, and be ravished always with her love.  Prov 5:15-20   
 
Dene Ward

I started teaching women’s classes far too long ago.  I was too young to have any idea either what I was doing or even what I was supposed to be doing.  But at the first place Keith preached—it was a part-time position under the oversight of elders—one of those elders asked me to teach the teenage girls.  I was only 20, but he said no one else would do it.  Then at the next congregation the ladies elected me the first night I attended the class that was already in existence.  Even though there were women forty years older than I, they thought that being “the preacher’s wife” made me automatically qualified.  I, who should have been sitting at the feet of older women, was frantically learning as I went.  I cringe sometimes wondering how many women I confused or misled with my inexperience and lack of wisdom.

              I hope I have improved.  I certainly have age and experience now, but the wisdom is an open question—always.  One thing about the age factor:  I have heard every excuse there is for not attending the women’s Bible study.  Are there truly valid reasons?  Yes, of course there are.  But there are far more of the other kind.  Let’s examine a few.

              “It’s so difficult to pay attention with the little ones in tow, and it’s so embarrassing when they cause distractions.”  Yes, it is difficult, but there is no need to be embarrassed.  Nearly thirty years ago when my current Tuesday morning class started up, we all had children still at home.  We made comments over the heads of playing toddlers and it was not uncommon that a few mothers would occasionally have to throw down their books and Bibles and run comfort a crying baby or settle a small-fry squabble.  We were all in the same boat and understood, but we never let our children be the excuse we gave the Lord for not finding time to get together and study.

              “But these lessons are so hard and take so long to do.”  I am afraid my lessons do tend to be this way.  But really now, what kind of hours would you expect to put in if you went back to school either to improve your job (vocation) or to get a promotion?  This is your spiritual education we’re talking about, and what you know will make a difference in how you conduct yourself in your spiritual vocation (Eph 4:1; 2 Pet 1:10) 

           A long time ago a brother went to the elders about one of Keith’s classes.  “It’s too deep,” he complained.  Those good shepherds were wise enough and strong enough to tell that brother what he needed to hear instead of what he wanted to hear.  “If I had been a Christian for forty years like you have,” they said, “I would be ashamed to say something in the Bible was too deep for me.”  Are you aware of Jesus’ statement when the apostles asked him why he spoke in parables, making it harder for people to understand?  Because the ones who care enough will work hard enough to understand it, he told them.  Do you care that much?

           I don’t make my lessons hard on purpose.  They seem difficult because the material is new to you.  I am trying to teach things you do not know, not rehash the things you do know.  That really would be superfluous and not worth a busy woman’s time.  Isn’t gaining a deeper knowledge and understanding of the Word of God worth rearranging your schedule, both in time to study and time to attend?  Can’t you give up something in order to study—like a TV show in the evenings?

           “Well they are so hard I don’t even know what to write down in the blanks.”  Ask anyone in the class how I run it.  Despite the reputation I must surely have for being a mean old lady who likes to mortify people, I never put anyone on the spot.  If you don’t know the answer, leave it blank.  But how will you ever find the answer if you don’t come and listen for it?  A good percentage of the class does exactly that, and one even laughs about how much erasing she has to do.  Now that’s a great attitude.  Can’t you follow her example?

           “My schedule is just so full.”  So is mine.  So is everyone’s.  The difference between those women and the ones who do not come (but could) is priorities.  They decided to make the time in their schedules for a Bible class.  They schedule things around it instead of the other way around.  They have trained their families to know, “Oh! It’s Tuesday,” or “the third Sunday,” and it really wasn’t that hard to do when they insisted on it.  And let’s just put this out there in black and white, plain and simple:  if you are too busy to study the Bible, you are too busy, and yes, maybe even sinfully busy if it causes you to neglect your Lord and His Word.

           “Once I get older and have less to do, then I will start attending ladies’ Bible class.”  Wait a minute!  Who are the older women told to teach?  Not the older ones who “have less to do” but the younger ones, that’s who!  The things we older teachers have to tell you will actually help you during your younger years.  If you listen and use these things, you might just avoid the problems that so many of your friends have.   What good will it do you when you finally come to class and all you have to offer are the things you have learned not to do from hard experience instead of wise teaching?  All my “old faithfuls” began young.  The vast majority have stayed with it—that’s why the class looks like a bunch of older women, not because they are the only ones who have time. 

           Many of the ones we have lost have moved to other areas.  I regularly hear from them how much they miss a class where they actually learn something new.  “We don’t have deep classes like this,” a visitor to our class once told me.  But here it is free for the taking to anyone who cares enough—and so few do. 

           I know I am not some popular, funny, good-looking teacher.  I know my lessons stomp on toes because I make applications that are real to life instead of feel good fluff.  The truly good teachers I know do the same.  We want to help you.  We want to share with you what we have worked hard to obtain, what means the world to us and should mean the world to you. 

           We also want to find young women who can take our places someday.  You simply must start early if you ever hope to do that.  I was 21 when I began serious, deep Bible study, and there is still so much left for me to learn and to share.  You could carry it on if you prepare yourself, but I can only give it if you are there to take it.
 
Older women likewise…are to teach what is good and to train the young women…Titus 2:3,4
And what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful [women] who will be able to teach others also. 2Tim 2:2
 
Dene Ward

We have already discussed an adult child’s obligations to his parents.  What about the parents’ obligations?  As we have indicated by the title, this relationship is a changing one.  After a child has grown, gone are the days when the parent can speak his opinion freely and expect it to be instantly accepted.  Instant obedience as a child was required.  Not so when the child is now running his own life.

              In fact, my first no-no for parents of adult children is to never try to control their lives.  “Adult” means “responsible” and unless you are willing to admit that you did a poor job of raising them, you should now be ready to sit back and see the results of your training, what should be a pleasant and satisfying prospect.  Failure in this area is usually caused by parents who want the vicarious thrills of their child’s achievements.  It’s not about you and what you want any longer.  This is his life and we need to be adults who can accept that fact.

              Another important no-no:  Do not come between couples.  And do not separate them either.  When my son comes to visit, I expect his wife to come too.  I would never ask him to come alone, yet I have heard of that very thing.  Your child-in-law should never feel unwelcome.  My husband and I are a unit.  You want one, you get both.  The same is true for your child and spouse. I covered this earlier in an in-law series, but it bears repeating:  your child’s spouse should feel love and acceptance in the family.  It is nothing but shameful when that does not happen.

              Next, and yet another big one, do not manipulate your adult child.  Do not use guilt trips.  Put “No one loves me,” “I guess you just don’t have time for me any more,” and “You never come to see me,” out of your vocabulary.  Recognize that your perspective may be skewed because you are not as busy as you used to be or you can no longer drive yourself a great distance so time passes more slowly and intervals between visits seem longer than they actually are.  Recognize that your child has obligations, obligations that you taught him to fulfill, like those to God, his wife and children, her parents, and his work.  Just what exactly were you doing at his age?  Probably the same things s/he is.

              Do not make the holidays a source of pain for everyone.  There are now two sets of parents to spend time with.  Accept your children’s  division of the time.  Believe me, they are doing their best, but too often both sets of parents want it all.  That simply will not work, and all your complaining does is ruin it for everyone.  They will grow to hate the holidays, and some of that is bound to rub off on you if you are the ones causing the problems.  Don’t allow your lives to be ruled by a calendar.  Work it out and make their time with you—whenever it is and for however long—something they will always cherish.

              And never, never, never use your grandchildren to get your way.  Anyone who uses a child is the lowest of the low.  Don’t even consider it.  And that includes deluding yourself that you are actually doing this in the child’s best interests, when it is obvious to everyone else that it is you who matters the most to you.

              Then there is the issue of losing your independence and their caring for you.  Sooner or later it will happen.  When the time comes, make caring for you easy and pleasant.  Stubborn refusal to follow doctor’s orders, take your medications, etc., will only cast a stumbling block in front of them as they try to fulfill their scriptural obligations, and you know what Jesus had to say about that.  Be realistic.  No one goes on forever.  (“Our outer man is decaying…”2 Cor 4:16.) When it is time to give something up, perhaps driving or living alone, do it gracefully.  Make caring for you the joy it should be to a grateful child.  Make your final years things they will miss instead of a relief to have over.

              This relationship bears obligations both ways.  I probably haven’t even touched them all, but these, and yesterday’s, are a good start.
 
Fathers [and mothers], do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged. (Col 3:21)

Dene Ward

Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right. Honor thy father and mother (which is the first commandment with promise), that it may be well with thee, and you may live long on the earth.  Eph 6:1-3. 

             Sometimes it seems to escape us of all people, we who preach the innocence of children as opposed to inherited total depravity, that the above passage cannot be directed at unaccountable children because children do not sin.  Jesus, in fact, directed this command to adult children in Matt 15:1-9.
So how do we as their children, but independent adults at the same time, honor our parents?
 
             Starting with Jesus’ point in Matt 15, we care for them, and that may indeed involve financial support.  But if a widow has children or grandchildren, let them first learn to show godliness to their own household and to make some return to their parents, for this is pleasing in the sight of God...But if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.  1Tim 5:4,8
 
            It may mean taking them into our homes as they near the end.  It may also mean completely changing the family dynamic, where you become the parent and they the children, doing what is in their best interests whether they want it or not, and even if it adversely affects the relationship.  What used to be their responsibility is now yours.

            Part of that care involves your companionship.  Try telling your wife you love her and then never spending any time with her!  Especially if you are down to one widowed parent, you are the one who can come closest to replacing what she has lost.  If a Christian is commanded to “visit” (Matt 25:31-40; James 1:27), surely a child is expected to.  If you live a distance away, regular telephone calls, emails, or letters if your parent eschews electronics, should be part of your routine.  No matter how busy your life, this should be on your schedule, like brushing your teeth or taking a shower.  You may as well spit in their faces as ignore them or put them at the bottom of the “if I have time” list.

           Honoring your parents may involve some forbearance and longsuffering.  They are slower now, in body at least, if not in mind.  Things that seem trivial to us may mean the world to them.  Respect them by tolerating those things equably.  Don’t stand there tapping your toes and heaving frustrated sighs.  They do notice and all you will accomplish is stealing that small amount of happiness from a life that is nearly over. We cannot claim to be the Lord’s disciple and do otherwise:  We who are strong have an obligation to bear with the failings of the weak, and not to please ourselves. Let each of us please his neighbor for his good, to build him up. For Christ did not please himself, but as it is written, “The reproaches of those who reproached you fell on me.” Rom 15:1-3
             
             Honoring your parents literally involves your speech to and about them.
           “Whoever curses his father or his mother shall be put to death. Exod 21:17
             Consecrate yourselves, therefore, and be holy, for I am the LORD your God. Keep my statutes and do them; I am the LORD who sanctifies you. For anyone who curses his father or his mother shall surely be put to death; he has cursed his father or his mother; his blood is upon him. Lev 20:7-9
             
            Most of us wouldn’t stoop so low as actually cursing our parents, but how do you handle a disagreement?  How do you speak about them to others?  Is love and concern apparent, or just aggravation and annoyance?  What stories do you tell your children about their grandparents?  Do you spread your inability to get along with them to the next generation, even if you do feel justified, and so ruin any hope of a wonderful grandparent/grandchild relationship for them?  Remember, gossip is gossip no matter who it’s about.

              Honoring parents is a command we must obey as surely as baptism.  Too many times we rationalize our way out of the commandment just as our unbaptized neighbors do.
 
They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God's righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them. Rom 1:29-32
Dene Ward