The World Today and My Grandchildren?

Holding Precious Hands

These stories weren’t on the front page the Dallas Morning News today. They appeared on the WORLD magazine site – and they are as troubling as reports of racism, cruelty and other upheavals:

·      Conceived by donated sperm or egg, some adult children are calling for regulation of third-party reproduction. Regulating the Marketplace of Children

·      The Nonhuman Rights Project is “ . . . asking the courts to recognize, for the first time, that these cognitively sophisticated, autonomous beings are legal persons who have the basic right to not be held in captivity.”

·      Elephants are People Too

·      Should Christians stop criticizing murderers because we’re sinners too? If we must be free of sin in order to call out sin, we should all cease talking and writing about it right now. A Pastor's Wife Justifies Her Job at an Abortion Center

I don’t have a clue how to comment on the complex news that greets us each morning, much less how to come along side any of the people who are hurting, confused or just caught up in the craziness these snapshots of today’s world represent. What’s more troubling is that for our grandchildren, these may well be normal in their world, the way abortion and homosexuality are rights in our children’s world.  How do I even talk about topics like these without sounding like Chicken Little?

Tim Keller, retired pastor from Redeemer Church NYC offers one suggestion, “Pray and pray a lot. Especially when you don't feel like praying at all.” 

That’s harder than talking.

So, I opened my Bible, and finished up the book of Numbers, chapters 33-36: God’s warnings and promises to His people. A Bible teacher summed them up: “Don’t affirm evil by excusing it as social issues.” 

Aye – there’s the rub – I don’t see how in the world I can do that! I like a lot the world has to offer – I don’t want to live as a hermit. But if the above articles are among the stories describing the people to whom we are called to go, I’m tempted to stay! (And urge the grandkids not to get involved!)   

God help me – and make a path upon which I can walk – being useful to the folks I love, and those whom you put in my path -- doing no harm, because these times sure seem crazy and overwhelming. 

Almighty God, we confess how hard it is to be your people. You have called us to be the church, to continue the mission of Jesus Christ to our lonely and confused world. Yet we acknowledge we are more apathetic than active, isolated than involved, callous than compassionate, obstinate than obedient, legalistic than loving.   

Gracious Lord, have mercy upon us and forgive our sins. Remove the obstacles preventing us from being Your representatives to a broken world. Awaken our hearts to the promised gift of your indwelling Sprit.

This we pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.  (Prayer of Confession from 03/08/15, Park Cities Presbyterian Church)  

 The Blessings of Skype

Numbers We Can Address

Twenty-nine percent of white children, 53% of Hispanics

and 

73% of black children are born to unmarried women.

No Dad, Big Problem

The absence of a husband and father from the home is a strong contributing factor to 

poverty, school failure, crime, drug abuse, emotional disturbance and a host of other social problems. (Article)

Thirty years ago, when we first got involved helping unmarried women cope with unplanned pregnancies, the “professionals” said many of these young women who found themselves expecting a baby outside of marriage had broken relationships with their dads.   In those three decades, marriages have had a harder time holding together, and because of government subsidies, single parenting is the alternative to abortion or adoption or coerced marriages.

While we have helped women to survive – how are we helping the children to live without their fathers?

Or, do fathers matter so much in a child’s development? 

First based on personal observation, dads were more fun than moms. They do neat  flying tricks with itty-bitty babies. They can break mom-rules that kids can’t. They aren’t so uptight about mud and messes. They like to cook junk food and are more ready to go to McDonald’s than moms ever are. They will play video games with their kids, and the stories they tell of their growing –up adventures are often way more fun than moms’ stories about ballet recitals.  Their stories even make moms laugh – nervously.

But dads were also tougher, using far fewer words than moms. They don’t count to three; they issue one word commands in voices that send budding debaters scurrying. In the middle of the might, in the middle of a nightmare, dads seem bigger than any monsters who may have snuck under the bed.

But dads without moms aren’t any more super-powered than moms without dads.  Kids need a man and a woman even to have been created; how much more do little folk need both parents to grow up?

God bless the woman who has the courage to give her child life; God help us help her to raise that child – making us kind and encouraging. But God show us how to help boys become men who love and cherish the lives they create.    

Right now, there are fathers who have bolted from their daughters and sons. To an increasing number of men, the children they create are as notches on a gun, and the women seem to be powerless to persuade them otherwise. So little girls grow up, seeking a man’s approval, and settling for rough approximations; little boys grow up without a man’s guidance, and settle for cheap imitations. 

And single moms often break down under a load that is meant to be shared. 

Broken relationships with dads – whether they are corporate executives, Hollywood glamour-types, preachers, or drifters – have sharp edges that cut children’s hearts, and wound many others. Thirty years or more years of encouraging the brokenness isn’t making stronger or better communities.  

·      He didn't tell me how to live; he lived, and let me watch him do it.  ~ Clarence Budington Kelland   

·      One father is more than a hundred Schoolemasters.  ~George Herbert, Outlandish Proverbs, 1640

·      Fathers represent another way of looking at life - the possibility of an alternative dialogue.  ~Louise J. Kaplan, Oneness and Separateness: From Infant to Individual, 1978

What’s the conversation we need to be having . . . first, in the church? We can’t offer much to social policy, until we are proving it is a good plan amongst ourselves.

Social Justice

Tonight we had dinner with some interesting folks – about 500! WORLD Magazine held a  dinner honoring Christians who are offering hope and compassion to hurting hearts without government help. They spotlighted three groups, from among many:

Crossover Ministry (www.crossoverministry.org) – Clinics offering healthcare, education and medicine to poor people in Richmond Virginia.
   
Snappin’ Ministries (www.snappin.org) – ministering to families with special needs children.
   

Forgiven Ministry (www.forgivenministry.org) helping reconcile children with their parents who are incarcerated.

Prior to the dinner we attended one of three seminars: Offering Hope to the Poor through Social Justice, with Marvin Olasky (editor of WORLD) and Stephen Tavani (Founder of WOW International – http://www.wowjam.com ). Both men are deeply committed to social justice – but not the way contemporary politicians and social engineers promote it.

The political left thinks social justice must needs not simply level all playing fields – they want  "From each according to his abilities, to each according to his need." The political right too often stumbles into social Darwinism – let the poor die off. The Bible teaches that justice separate the guilty from the innocent; (social) justice is always accompanied with righteousness – these are the foundation of God’s throne – and must be the core of how we serve the poor and hopeless.

Mr. Tavani believes if the Gospel is true and works in the worst places, it is true and works anywhere. To that end, he and enormous corps of volunteers go into tough communities with everything from free cold water, bicycle repair, hair cuts, manicures, food, family photographs, games and shoes. He and his volunteers escort a small number of folk at a time into a tent, and fit each with  free name-brand athletic shoes – after bathing the feet of those they serve.  Is it any wonder they draw crowds?   And to those crowds, he offers the Gospel of salvation, as he and his volunteers meet real needs. They believe doing is more important than saying. 

Mr. Olasky believes this as well, citing the difference between the ancient Romans and Christians hospitality. The Romans were hospitable to those who could do them some good; the Christians entertained those who could never repay. (Luke 14:12-14) He speculated that one reason Christianity may have caught on was not so much the teaching, but the practice by which Christians shared and risked their lives to serve.

It was quite an evening!