Seasons of Parenting

There’s still nearly another month of winter left, but where I live most people are getting anxious for warmer temperatures and the flowers that appear when spring comes. There are good and bad things about every season, and everyone seems to have a favorite. I have found that the same is true of the seasons of life.

My heart has always been at home, and so the seasons of life for me have largely centered around my children’s lives. As a young mother years ago, my own Mom (who was also a stay-at-home Mom) told me her belief that the best years of raising children were when they were ages 0 to 5 – when everyone was still home without a lot of outside influences. This was also my personal favorite age when raising kids. But I have heard other mothers who cannot wait until their children are old enough to go to school, or others who cannot wait until their children leave home for good. It seems that we humans have a hard time finding joy and contentment in every season. Admittedly, there are ups and downs in every season of raising children.  

Babies bring new beginnings and new life. They are innocent and totally dependent on us. But they also bring new responsibility that can be overwhelming for some. Preschool children can be both fun and challenging. They are discovering the world and discovering themselves, and they are constantly learning and eager to do so. But this can lead to tantrums as they try to assert the beginnings of their independence, and parents have the new responsibility of teaching and training them to mold who they are becoming. This is not always easy, and some children can be more difficult than others.

School-age children bring new dimensions to parenting. There is new learning, new things to teach, and more independence as they encounter more outside influences and we have less control over them. Sports, music lessons, and other extracurricular activities bring both new opportunities and new challenges. The pressure of grades and competition with others is also accompanied by social pressures like bullying and trying to fit in with peers. And the teen years bring the added issues of relating to the opposite sex and making future plans for adulthood. Sometimes as parents this season of life can seem to have no end.

And then our children become young adults and begin the process of leaving home. There is college or military or fulltime employment or sometimes a failure to launch successfully. In the first few years that follow high school graduation, decisions are made regarding careers and other aspects of life that will affect the rest of their lives. Sometimes we celebrate with them such things as another graduation, a new home, or a wedding. Other times we pray for them as they work through difficulties or make unwise decisions.

After that we enter another long season, but it is different from any other. Our children are no longer dependent on us, and they no longer look to us for teaching and training. We may have grandchildren who are precious that we are involved with, but we are largely watching from afar as our own children begin the passage through the same seasons that we have already weathered. We can influence the next generation, but we are no longer responsible for them. Just like the natural seasons, the cycle always repeats itself from generation to generation. Prayer is a constant in every season . . . more on that in next week’s post! 

In our twilight years, those of us whose hearts are at home must look for other ways to occupy our time and new ways to find fulfillment. But there is joy and contentment in every season if we look for it.

 

Choosing to Love

Valentine’s Day isn’t just for lovers, even though that’s how it’s advertised. But those ads can be hurtful for people who don’t have a mate or a date. What is advertised is really more about feelings than what real love is. And you can celebrate Valentine’s Day by loving those around you regardless of your circumstances.

Yes, love is the word we use to describe the special feelings we have for the people we are closest to – our spouses, our parents, our children, our grandchildren, and our close friends. But real love goes beyond feelings and prompts us to show our love with actions. Real love makes us more patient, more kind, more hopeful, more persistent. Real love doesn’t insist on its own way and isn’t irritable or resentful. Real love doesn’t go away, because real love isn’t just a warm, fuzzy feeling; real love is a choice.

And real love is hard work. It’s hard to get love right when people do annoying things. Or when people aren’t loving in return. Or when I have to sacrifice what I want for what someone else needs. Or when life gets harder and all your energy is turned toward other things. Or when you just don’t feel like being patient or kind or very loving. But when Jesus said “love one another” to his disciples, there were no caveats; it was a call to love others all the time – regardless of how they present themselves – in the same way that Jesus loved us and gave his life for us.

I, for one, have to work hard sometimes to love others. I’ve come a long way, but I still have a long way to go. It is helpful for me to remember that I am not always the most lovable person either. I am thankful that it isn’t just up to me and my natural abilities to get love right. We are told in 1 John 4:19 that we are able to love others because God first loved us. He is the source of any love we have to give, and that’s good news! While I have to make the choice moment by moment to love others, the strength I need to get it right comes from God’s Spirit working in and through me. The more I surrender to him, the more I want to love others, even if they aren’t very lovable. And the more lovable I also personally become.

Let’s take the opportunity this Valentine’s Day to choose to love well those around us and to look for ways to spread God’s love wherever we go.

 

Passing the Baton

 

It’s official – I am a relic, an antique. Oh, maybe not in the traditional sense of these words, since I’m not over 100 years old yet and do not possess historical or sentimental interest for anyone else! But a quick dictionary search gives me some other definitions for these words that seem to fit me more and more every day: old, antiquated, belonging to earlier times, old-fashioned. And I don’t have to look far to be reminded of how much the world has changed in my lifetime.

            In fact, most young people today would probably use different words to describe my approach to life – words like outmoded, obsolete, a has-been, or past the peak of effectiveness or popularity. If I listen to the world around me, I can get discouraged. It is sometimes easy to believe that the world is passing me by. But I prefer to focus on some of the other definitions I found for these words: possessing high value because of considerable age, venerable (impressive by reason of age), and vintage (recognized as having enduring interest, importance, or quality). I hope I am viewing the people who are older than me in this way.

The Bible makes it clear that older people are to be revered and appreciated for their experience and the wisdom that experience brings. But there is a responsibility that also comes with age – older people are to teach younger people and tell future generations about what God has done for them (Psalm 145:4; Psalm 78:4, 6-7). I want to be faithful to pass on how good God is to my children and grandchildren and all those younger people around me so that “a people yet to be created may praise the Lord” (Psalm 102:18).

In an ever-changing world where I seem to be getting more irrelevant every day, I might keep using a paper map when I travel or prefer paying my bills by check instead of online or keep paper copies of receipts or emails. I’ll never fully “join” the new way the world operates. I’ve lived too long and can remember the way things used to be and how life worked in a simpler time without the latest and greatest. But, relic or not, I will make sure that the younger people around me, especially those in my own family, continue to hear about God’s goodness to me and all he has done in my life. My prayer is that they will find reason to praise God as a result. And may I also listen well to those who are older than me and praise God because of their stories.