Recently someone asked me about the time I spend with non Christians and basically I said, I am in seminary, have 3 kids, and am active at Evergreen so I don’t do much intentionally. Well…I think God is opening my eyes. In the two weeks since that question was posed to me I spoke with a mom of one of my kids friends about her 17 year old son becoming a father with his 14 year old girlfriend. I would not say I was witnessing by any means but lending an ear and listening. Then I was talking to another one of my kids friend’s mom and she was telling me how she used to go to church and still believes but is disillusioned with church. We talked on the phone for about an hour! Her son ended up coming to church with us and I am hoping to spend some more time with her in the near future not just to get her to come to church but because I genuinely like her and we have a lot in common. Then today Mackenzie asked if she could make cookies for the new neighbors and I said of course. When she was done we went over and gave them cookies. I have been burning their names in my brain, Mike and Alisha. Just when I think my world is narrow and I can’t do anything about it God opens my eyes to the people I do have in my life and I knew that but for some reason when the question was asked I was drawing a blank. What I understand more and more is that evangelism is just being my authentic self before God and before people. There are plenty of people with in arms distance who don’t know Christ, have drifted away, or know Christ and I just need to say hi, lend and ear, make a comment, or whatever one does in the rhythm of life.
Archive for May, 2007
Spiritual Development part 3
“StageThree: Synthetic/Conventional Faith There is a third stage we call synthetic/conventional faith which typically has its rise beginning around age 12 or 13. It’s marked by the beginning of what Piaget calls formal operational thinking. That simply means that we now can think about our own thinking. It’s a time when a person is typically concerned about forming an identity, and is deeply concerned about the evaluations and feedback from significant other people in his or her life. We call this a synthetic/conventional stage; synthetic, not in the sense that it’s artificial, but in the sense that it’s a pulling together of one’s valued images and values, the pulling together of a sense of self or identity.
One of the hallmarks of this stage is that it tends to compose its images of God as extensions of interpersonal relationships. God is often experienced as Friend, Companion, and and Personal Reality, in relationship to which I’m known deeply and valued. I think the true religious hunger of adolescence is to have a God who knows me and values me deeply, and can be a kind of guarantor of my identity and worth in a world where I’m struggling to find who I can be.
At any of the stages from two on you can find adults who are best described by these stages. Stage Three, thus, can be an adult stage. We do find many persons, in churches and out, who are best described by faith that essentially took form when they were adolescents.” James Fowler
This has to be my favorite stage. I love coming along side people as they are putting the pieces together. That’s probably why I see all my children at some point in this stage. It is the whole nurture piece of development. I passionately want my children to have a healthy sense of self and a solid identity grounded in Jesus. I go out of my way to nurture that piece of their spiritual development. I think this stage is where people are trying to figure out who am I, who is God and how do those two identities meld. In many ways this is a continuum but there is a big piece that must be formed as a foundation. I have found my self growing and questioning my identity as I am coming to the later part of my thirties. Now it is not the same degree as it was in my teens or even twenties it is more like a refining but identity development none the less.
One of the dangers of this stage is making spirituality all about relationship. Relationship is huge but we must not neglect the cognitive or “knowing” God piece. Youth groups that narrowly emphasis experience and relationship with others and with God tend to nurture superficiality. I know I have done it. It is a tenuous balance that needs to be struck to bring about a healthy spiritual foundation. If we neglect the concrete learning done in the prior stage and focus solely on the relationship building we stunt the overall growth. The question for me is how do I take the facts and concrete knowing of stage two and add the relationship piece as the child’s brain is growing in the abstract area?
I think it is really important to validate the questions and be slow to give answers. It is better to gently make points and ask questions back that get the person thinking rather than steam rolling them with your thoughts. As we nurture teens or adults for that matter we need to know when to teach and when to let them wrestle with the thought. I have found with my children I usually get a lot more and hopefully they do as well when I gentle press into their questions and concerns rather than making everything a teaching moment. The beauty of that is we are building the relationship while we are allowing the other person to wrestle with God and build that relationship. If I just answer all the questions carte blanch than that person becomes dependent on me for spiritual growth but what should be happening is we as humans should become co-journeyers with God being the one we are dependent on. Yes, I know more than my children thus I need to provide leadership but they need to learn to go to God ultimately and I need to nurture them in that direction. Leading with the goal of leading them away from me and towards the Father.
This is scary and why I think many parents tend toward the heavy handed approach. We feel safer when we tell our kids what to believe and what is right or wrong. The down side is then when they are on their own they have no internal compass. They look to external cues and when those cues are not what God wants they are left with disillusionment and confusion. Working this past year on a college campus has done more to refine my parenting than anything else. We need to help our children develop a relationship with God so that they can hear the voice of the Holy Spirit within them. The adolescent years are ripe for this type of nurturing.
Sigh…
Okay, class last night was not as bad as it has been…at least there was minimal bashing. But then the last half hour our prof wanted to share his formula for evangelism. First we got a bookmark circa 1950 with space to write in 7 names of unsaved people we know. Then he proceeded to handout a tract, yes a tract! He said it was a softer more relational track than those of the past. The title is “Would you like to know God, personally.” Personally was the added touch. I thought we were done but then he says when you feel more emboldened and ready here is another track. Yes that’s right the advanced evangelism tract, “Have you made the Wonderful Discovery of the Spirit-Filled Life?” All this was done in a ministry to the people who filled out visitors cards at his church. He even told us about the buddy system if you are not comfortable doing it solo.
The thing is this guy was completely sold on this method. He spoke of it with passion and conviction. No one could judge his motives as anything but genuine. I am sure lives have been impacted and people have decided to follow Jesus because of his efforts. I just can’t jump on the band wagon. I am sure I would break out in hives if I was made to hand out tracts.
Week after week I look around and wonder have I entered a time warp? Am I in high school or graduate school?
Spiritual Develpoment: Part 2
“Stage Two: Mythic/Literal Faith
The second stage we call mythic/literal faith. Here the child develops a way of dealing with the world and making meaning that now criticizes and evaluates the previous stage of imagination and fantasy. The gift of this stage is narrative. The child now can really form and re-tell powerful stories that grasp his or her experiences of meaning. There is a quality of literalness about this. The child is not yet ready to step outside the stories and reflect upon their meanings. The child takes symbols and myths at pretty much face value, though they may touch or move him or her at a deeper level.” James Fowler
This stage of development is probably the most frustrating for me because children tend toward a legalism of sorts. Now this is not the same as we see in adults that are rigid in their faith because children are not cognitively ready for abstract thinking that they naturally tend toward the rigid but adults should have moved beyond this. The gift of this stage is story giving meaning to life. This is where the stories of the Bible are going to have concrete meaning for the child. In the previous stage the stories inspire the imagination and now we are adding the dimension of meaning. Symbols take on literal meaning. I would push the parables. Fill their minds with the stories of Jesus. Jesus is an amazing story teller and the stories of Jesus provide some great illustrations for children to grab on to.
The danger here is the child gets stuck in a works and righteousness stage. Two of my children are in this stage now and what amazes me is how rigid they are at times. The task of Tom and I is to gently, without condemning, help them to loosen up. We are in a tug-of-war so to speak with Ryan over a friend of his. His friend, due to his parent’s parenting style, is unruly and at times dangerous around other children. He once bit a neighbor child so bad that it broke the skin and caused serious bruising. And another time, in our yard, he belittled a child so bad that the child was cowering on the ground. If Tom had not caught sound of it we are not sure what he would have done. It has been several weeks since the latest incident and so we are allowing this child to come back around only when Tom or I are around and only for a while. Well here is the dilemma, Ryan thinks we should forgive and accuses us of hating his friend. He has a hard time understanding why we set limits. Without arguing and debating with Ryan I have had to explain, over and over, to him the balance between forgiveness and restoring relationship from a safety stand point.
These are the types of issues we need to keep pressing in on with our children. As parents, are job is to have reasonable expectations and continue to gently guide them towards the next stage. This is one reason I have trouble with stage development theories when they are applied too strictly. There is a tenuous balance between nature and nurture and anecdotally speaking I am more and more convinced that nurture effects the the quality of development and I think can impact the rate of development. Plants can grow without any care, I have plenty of them in my yard! But a plant that is nurtured and cared for not only grows better but in my experience produces fruit/flower faster. As I type this I realize parents must guard against rushing their children’s development but a natural outflow of nurturing can very well be more spiritually mature children. The agenda should never be the parents goals but an attitude of coming alongside our children and encouraging them, correcting them, and most importantly supporting the work God is doing in them.
Spiritual Development: Part one
“Stage One: Intuitive/Projective Faith
The first stage we call intuitive/projective faith. It characterizes the child of two to six or seven. It’s a changing and growing and dynamic faith. It’s marked by the rise of imagination. The child doesn’t have the kind of logic that makes possible or necessary the questioning of perceptions or fantasies. Therefore the child’s mind is “religiously pregnant,” one might say. It is striking how many times in our interviews we find that experiences and images that occur and take form before the child is six have powerful and long-lasting effects on the life of faith both positive and negative.” James Fowler
Although Fowler’s stages begin at two which makes sense he does emphasis the importance of the infancy stage and I agree. The foundation of trust building is important to the first stage of faith development. I child who is not nurtured and tended to in infancy has a foundation of mistrust. The beauty of the human design is we are resilient and most deficits in infancy are easily made up for as the years go on, for the most part many are, but it just gets harder as they get further in their development.
Now onto stage one. I have to say spiritually speaking this stage was great for me with my kids. Kids are sponges and they really do have an amazing imagination. I would not let the age parameter be too rigid though. As with any stage theory one needs to keep loosely to the age correlation with the stage of development. There are so many factors that go into the rate of development that it is dangerous to be rigid.
I remember talking a lot about heaven during this season in Mackenzie’s development. When she was 4 her best friend died of heart failure. I had nannied for the family for 2 years so we spent a lot of time with them. It was tough but utilizing the imagination she naturally had was very helpful for her to process her grief. We spent a lot of time dreaming of where Hannah was and what she could be doing. At the time I had no clue about spiritual development theory and all I was doing was talking with her in terms she understood and taking her lead.
There were times when I felt the need to correct her thinking and in hindsight it was not harmful but it was a waste of time and was not helpful. Any correcting, I think, is best done in sharing your insights in imagination speak. For instance, Mackenzie was convinced that Hannah was an angel. At the time I felt the need to correct her and so I told her no Hannah was not an angel but was with the angels and how people do not become angels and angels do not become people. Not bad but in hindsight I think it would have been more helpful for to hear it in an imagination story. Such as, “I imagine Hannah is the same as she was here but better. She could run forever without tiring and her lips no longer turned blue when she was cold. Hannah gets to eat what ever she wants (she was on a special diet) and she gets to play with all of God’s angels. ” That way it is more of a coming alongside and imagining together and feels less like a lecture that they cannot grasp anyway. The distinction between Hannah and angels is made but it is not the main point.
I think as parents we tend to try too hard to “teach” spirituality at these ages when in reality it seems more conducive to engage the imagination that God has given them. Their cognitive ability to engage the Bible is not there yet but as we read stories and dream with our children we can engage their imagination without worrying too much about the facts or details. We don’t want to go into falsehood or anything but there will be plenty of time for specifics later when they can actually retain it and wrestle with it.
During these precious and formative years I want children to develop a great supernatural imagination where the God of the Universe is as big of a God possible for them to dream up. I think it is a mistake to think our children are not affected by what they do not understand. The images stay with them for years to come and as parents we want to make sure those are good and positive images. As Fowler said,”…images that occur and take form before the child is six have powerful and long-lasting effects on the life of faith both positive and negative.”
Spirituality and Parenting
Lately, I have been wrestling with the spiritual development of children. I had a long conversation with my eldest sister (the one who introduced me to Christ), about her children who are struggling. She was telling me about a conversation she had with our cousins. Basically, the dilemma is they (the parents) are all Christ followers and yet none of their children have decided to follow Christ. I am not talking about a handful of kids but between our two families there are 28 children 17 of which are adults, of the 17 adult children none are Christ followers and yet all but 2 sets of the parents are Christ followers, at least when they were raising the children. Subsequently one of my sisters and her husband became Christ followers but their children were already grown. I know that this is confusing but stick with it. Of the children that are still minors 2 are already straying from Jesus. This is very disheartening to me. I think my extended family is not unusual. As I reflect back on the youth Tom and I worked with only a handful have chosen to follow Christ as adults. Being the parent of 3 children this topic is near to my heart. I know we cannot make our children Christ followers but we can sheppard them in a way that is most conducive to their spiritual development. A way that works with the Holy Spirit and not against him.
In human development class we spent a couple of class sessions talking about spiritual development, this is one reason I do not regret attending a seminary. It has provided me with much to ponder, as we raise our children and nurture them spiritually. I thought I would process on this blog some of my thoughts.
What my professor presented was one man’s theory his name is James Fowler . Although Fowler is a Christ follower he has attempted to provide a broad paradigm that accommodates all forms of spiritual expression. His theory should be seen as just that a theory and should be held to loosely, I believe. As I type these series of thoughts I will use his theory as a guide and wrestle with its benefits and its limits. Most of my reflections will be anecdotal because my main goal is to reflect on the life of my children and how I see this played and playing out in their development. I hope to gain insights that will increase my effectiveness in shepparding their souls.
What’s the Point?
I am in a class called Loving God; Loving Others. As I ponder that title I can think of a multitude of directions to go with it. Considering this is a graduate level class by more mature believers than the average I would bring in some classic literature that challenges the student to think to, to wrestle, to engage God and engage others. It could really be good full of dialog and discourse.
But what do I get, a prof who spends the first class talking about the evils of the emergent church and the second talking about the evils of AA, yes AA for 1.5 hours! No love here. One of my classmates and I are frequently looking at each other going what’s the point! The thing is I want to say something anything but every time someone challenges his assumptions they get blown off. This guy has come in with an agenda and no one is going to derail it. Originally the class was to be taught by a staff prof but last minute he was unable to do it and so they brought in this guy. Half the time in the class I feel like a high schooler in youth group being lectured at, except he throws in a few big words. If we, graduate level students, do not have the basics of loving God and loving people down then we got bigger problems.
The one thing I have learned with the limited teaching I have done is one needs to engage the audience. Now this is not just performing and charisma but more essential…a real human connection. To be able to speak to the heart of humans. I have heard my share of charismatic speakers and usually I come away feeling energized but rarely changed. People get drawn in by pure energy but it is passion that speaks to the heart. When a speaker is passionate and truly believes what they are teaching it shows. Loving God and loving people should be a topic of passion but I feel dulled and patronized if not attacked at times. I only have 4 more lectures to sit through. I am learning to pick and choose my battles and doing battle with a dry and uncreative 68 year old prof is one I am willing to pass on…the odds for change are not in my favor. I know for some this maybe a cop out but I have limited energy and I am choosing not to spend it here. None the less my class evaluation forms will be filled out accurately!
Great visit with a good Friend
Last July Tom and I lost a dear friend, Don, I wrote a few posts about him. Well, today I had breakfast with his widow. It was the first time I had spent any extended time with her since the funeral. I showed up at her new place around 9:30am and finally at noon I left and only because I had to meet Tom for his Dr’s appointment. She shared the journey she has been on over the last several months and it has been rough. Through engaging with her story and I came away both refreshed and angry. Let’s focus on the refreshment. First of all this woman is 62, and this is the second husband she has buried, both named Don ironically. We used to work together in small groups ministry at a prior church. She is both a mentor and friend to me. And lately I really have needed a mentor, and after seeing her today I know I am going to have keep up with her at least every couple of months.
She shared with me her prayer life of the past year and a few journal entries a few times I was near tears. It is amazing how powerful it is when someone just gently and effortlessly invites you into their journey. Her grief was utterly dark and personal and she shared her moments with me. I regret not being there for her at the time but she didn’t even skip a step with me. It was as if we did not miss a moment of time in our friendship. She was the one who sharpened me when I was rethinking my definition of church. She is the one who encouraged me to take risks and trust God as he refined me. So to hear of her pain and subsequent healing was hard and good. The topics of our discussion was her sharing her experience of Jesus over these months of grieving and the absence of her church family, this is when I felt anger and disappointment.
What she told me was most people were willing to cheer her on but few came alongside. That to me is the essence of community, coming alongside, walking the journey together. We all have people who will tell us the “You can do it. I am sure it will be fine. I know you will make it.” but what we need are people who say let me walk with you, let me share in carrying your burden. How that plays out varies but it definitely involves being present with them in one way or another.
Thanks Chris
Not only did Chris give Ryan a bass guitar, he saved us from a horrendous birthday gift. My mother-in-law is a fabulous woman whom I love dearly but she has a knack for getting birthday gifts that get under Tom’s and mine skin. So today she called to let us know if we do not come up with a gift suggestion that she was eyeing a inflatable pool that is waist deep on an adult, came with a pump and is hell on earth. I would much rather take them to a pool or the river than have that monstrosity living in my backyard for every neighborhood kid to be yelling and screaming in my backyard. If you can’t tell I have strong feelings about this! But I hate saying no to her because she is so kind and generous.
Now to how Chris saved us; this time when said mother-in-law called and told me about the horrendous birthday gift idea I was able to tell her Ryan got a bass guitar and we need strings, amps, and necessary cords which we would have a hard time affording. She said she would give him a check for his birthday so we could go gear shopping!!!! So Chris you rock and I am grateful for your generosity on oh so many levels.
On a High
Today was an awesome day. I love the sunshine, heat and brightness. I even got a little sunburn on my arms, story of my life. I cannot remember the last time I tanned, well.
I love days that are full of hope and dreams. I know that dreams and hopes do not always pan out and that is not the point. Dreams are not about exact fulfillment but the ability to imagine is priceless. The ability to imagine opens up possibilities. Possibilities lead to hope and life. When we as human beings can get away from navel gazing and look up and around and dream we have hope. My hope is invasively infused with Christ and that gives me the freedom to dream big. I think often we Christ followers do not dream God sized dreams. We put God in a box when we limit our potential. Please do not get me wrong this is not a believe and it will be done ideology. I know that many…most of my dreams and hope will not be realized. At this moment I have at least 5 career dreams, none of them may be realized and realistically only 1-3 of my dreams will be if any but when a person has options and hope they know what they need to be listening for. God speaks and he speaks into my dreams…my future; I believe it wholeheartedly! I also believe he may take me in a different directions than my dreams of today.
The dance between God’s will and my will is a paradoxical and intricate dance. And it takes two…As I dream and craft and imagine and hope for my future I engage God. I say “Dance with me.” My prayer, oh God, is dance with me, help me craft my future, release my destiny, and ultimately through my unique role let your will be done. Free me from putting you in a box by putting myself in a box. As your servant, as your feet, as your hands, I have no right to not think that all things are possible. I used to fear and still sometimes do praying “Have your way with me God, let your will be done,” but I am learning to trust you, to trust that what you said you meant. I have known that intellectually, I have been able to parrot that back to people, but now I feel is the time in my life where the proverbial rubber meets the road. I am scared and excited..paradoxical, again, go figure!
