John 15:17 - These things I command you, that you love one another.
You never really know how you will respond in a certain situation until you are faced with it. It’s vital to be daily in God’s Word and to maintain a close relationship with the Lord so you have an immediate source to turn to for help. And choosing a loving response can look very different depending on the circumstances.
One way I choose to love my family is by being open to hearing about every last detail they want to share with me about their lives. I am not always immediately available to listen for an hour about the coolest new features of an iPad game but I generally find the time at some point in my day to focus my attention and listen to whatever my husband or children want to share.
As a result, my family knows that I am a safe person to talk to about everything from hair products to vehicle maintenance to homework woes and especially about the more serious issues that come up in life.
I didn’t know that my daughter would bring home so many serious issues going on with her friends - and starting so young! When she was in second grade, my daughter befriended a girl whose family had moved here from Arkansas to begin a church plant. She was the oldest of 3 children and she confided in my daughter that she and a 5th grade boy at their school who, also attended her church, would sneak off into a closet at church and “kiss on the lips”. I was immediately concerned for the safety of this little girl and my innocent daughter didn’t understand why. I had choices to make. I REALLY didn’t want to have this conversation with my 2nd grader - she was too young! But I realized that she was going to be a person who people trusted and confided in and if I was going to be a Godly example, I needed to handle this moment properly. So, after praying about it and explaining in the most sensitive way possible the reason her friend was potentially in danger and why I needed to act, I contacted her parents and shared what I had heard. Thankfully, as it turned out, she had been lying for attention. Her parents took it seriously and she apologized to my daughter and there was no resulting damage to their friendship.
Being loving to our children means being loving toward their friends as well. I don’t think it would have mattered at the time to my daughter if I hadn’t intervened. But because I did, she learned several valuable lessons - the most important of which is that love sometimes means doing something hard and her Mom is willing to do the hard stuff of love to protect her and her friends.
Fast forward to 5th, 6th and 7th grades where my daughter and several of her friends were targeted and threatened by a girl who was mentally challenged but had unfettered access to the internet and was, herself, being exploited by a pedophile. I repeatedly met with this girl’s mother over coffee to talk to her about what was happening with her daughter and how it was impacting MY daughter and, as sweet as she was to me, she refused to believe her sweet daughter could have been behaving in such ways and came to see my daughter as a bully who was spreading lies and trying to hurt, not help her daughter. Ultimately I had to bring the issue to the attention of the school administration for everyone’s safety (thankfully they got the police involved) and in the end, her parents withdrew her from the school - still maintaining her innocence despite overwhelming evidence. It was a painful process but I would not have been showing love to anyone if I hadn’t stepped in.
Now, I am known by my daughter and her friends as the one that can be counted on to have the hard conversations with other moms and to do my best to get help for her friends when they need it. High school is emotionally very difficult. I have already had one conversation with a mom about a potential eating disorder in her daughter. My daughter now asks her friends when they are concerned as a group about someone “Do you want me to ask my mom to talk to their mom?”
Until I am asked to get involved now, I generally just sit back and pray while I wait to hear how serious the problem really is. But I am not afraid to step in and do the hard thing because I love genuinely. Jesus loved ME. What He suffered for me was far worse than any discomfort I might feel about confronting another mother about a problem her child is facing and praying with her about how to help. And the really funny thing is how my daughters friends all started calling me “mom” and programmed my number in their phones a “other mother”. But it’s kinda awesome too.😉
No comments:
Post a Comment