The story of Abraham, and his willingness to sacrifice his
son Isaac on a pile of stones for God, is one that any parent should be totally
uncomfortable with. Frankly, I just
would never have gone that far. However,
lately in my parenting journey God has continued to bring this Old Testament
story to my mind. He’s been calling me
to hold up my parenting to this example that is in scriptures for us. Am I holding my children loosely? Am I authentic in my spiritual journey with
them? Am I trusting God enough to leave my children in his hands?
I am sure many Christians would find our family's parenting
methods risky. We do not do family
devotions. We do own a children’s Bible,
but let our kids choose to read from it just like any other children’s book in
our collection. We do not regularly pray
before each meal or even at bedtime. We
let our oldest chose to not attend Awanas this last year. We go to a church and we are grateful for our
church community, but there are Sundays when we choose to enjoy pancakes and a
slow, leisurely morning because our weeks have been full of chaos and
rush.
They also know that really bad things happen in our
world. We were open with them right from
the start of their grandma’s cancer diagnosis.
There was a lot of genuine, fervent prayer spoken by three young boys
during all her treatments. They know
that war happens, and that there are always negative consequences in war even
if the end seems justified. We don’t
avoid topics of death. We often tell our
kids that we aren’t happy with social injustice; that it is not right and that
we are uncomfortable with the fact that God does not appear to stop it. We talk about our responsibility to be Jesus
here and now, to be the light, to be the heroes.
Our best spiritual conversations seem to happen late at
night or when we are driving. One such
talk happened when B announced from the back seat, “I want to get baptized.”
We hadn’t talked about this, been pushing this, or been
doing any intentional education about the obedience of baptism. Actually, my husband and I both have Quaker
backgrounds and don’t view the practice of baptism necessary in a Christian’s
journey. But I was curious and I want to
honor my son’s personal understanding of a God who loves him and wants to be in
relationship with him.
“Really? Why?”
“I love Jesus and I want other people to know and I want
more of Jesus.”
I smiled. “Well, those are good reasons, except you know you
don’t get more of Jesus when you get baptized,” I told him. I loved his desire
to feel and know Jesus more…that is what excited me the most from this
conversation. “You have all the Jesus you need.
But when we do things that help us know God more like pray, or read our
Bible, there is joy felt in that. When we listen to how he’s moving us and are
obedient, it might make us feel closer to him.”
“Yeah, but I don’t want to do it at church. I want to do it at our river, and I want to
invite people and eat hot dogs.” Then he
listed those he wanted to invite. I
almost wanted to cry. Over half his list
included friends who probably have never even heard the word baptism.
It was kind of a proud mommy moment, a God-sighting. This desire to be baptized really felt right,
authentic. It was about B. It wasn’t about my husband and me looking
good to the other Christian parents at our church. This was an organic movement of the Holy
Spirit in my son. I felt as though God
had smiled down on me and said, “Thank you for letting me move and speak to
your son. Thank you for trusting
me. Thank you for holding him loosely.”
