Open Your Hand Wide

This time of year always puts me in a more charitable mood, as I know it does many people, and Deuteronomy 15 has been on my heart lately.
(7) If there is among you anyone in need, a member of your community in any of your towns within the land that the Lord your God is giving you, do not be hard-hearted or tight-fisted toward your needy neighbor. (8) You should rather open your hand, willingly lending enough to meet the need, whatever it may be. (10) Give liberally and be ungrudging when you do so, for on this account the Lord will bless you in all your work and in all you undertake. (11) Since there will never cease to be some in need on the earth, I therefore command you, “Open your hand to the poor and needy neighbor in your land.”
The King James translation adds, “Open thine hand wide” unto the poor in the land. Opening my hand is something that I was raised with, so it comes somewhat naturally to me, but “open your hand wide” has been ringing in my ears lately. As the soup kitchens in my area fret that they are serving nearly double the number of meals that they served last year, as the layoffs continue at the local companies, as the cost of living increases, I look at how I have been blessed and I know that God would have me share that with others. Still, in the back of my mind I will think, “But I should stash away some more in savings in case I lose my job,” or, “I should set aside more money for my retirement,” or whatever other excuse I would like to make. But I feel the tug again… “open your hand wide.”

Oddly enough for a childfree person, I have given a great deal of attention to organizations that support children. Despite the fact that I don’t particularly like most children, I don’t want to see them harmed by the adults in their lives. I don’t want them to be hungry; I don’t want them to be cold; I don’t want them to go without Christmas gifts. In most cases, these children are victims of situations that are so far out of their control, and I want to help. I have had the recent pleasure to buy gifts for “tween” girls through the Salvation Army’s angel tree program, and I have sent extra money for Christmas gifts for the girls I sponsor through World Vision. My husband’s favorite cause is the summer camp where he used to work.

We are also mindful of the local food pantries, shelters (for people and for animals), and other service organizations. Still, I am always asking myself, is it enough? And is it going to the right places? And will it be used for the right thing?

I am blogging about this to share my struggle but also to call others to action with me. It is sometimes frustrating to be generous when there are some lazy and unscrupulous people out there who abuse the systems that the government or private charities have put in place. However, we cannot be excused from doing what is right just because there are others who are doing what is wrong.

Some of you reading this may feel that what little you have to give would not mean much, but I would remind you of the widow’s mite story in Mark 12:42-43. Jesus said of her, “This poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the treasury. For all of them have contributed out of their abundance; but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had.” And your gift in concert with the gifts of others will grow into something more meaningful than you expect (think of the money the Salvation Army raises as people donate their pocket change to the Red Kettle campaigns!). Others of you may need to be on the receiving end at this time, and there is nothing wrong with that. Be a good steward of what you are given, and some day you will be able to give back to someone else in need.

Don’t Say I Didn’t Warn You

Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you. -Matthew 5:11-12

To repeat what I say in the introduction of my blog, many of us Christians give the world ammunition to hate us. From misguided misinterpretations of the Bible (I didn’t realize until I was a senior in high school that there is NO verse in the Bible prohibiting the consumption of alcohol), to judgment and unforgiveness toward someone who sins, to angry and violent diatribes against anyone who believes differently, I have seen it all and hung my head in shame… especially in the instances where I am guilty myself. Fortunately for all of us, God’s gracious heart is big enough to accept all of us, no matter what faults we have.

And there is a certain trickiness to following God, especially when it comes to interpreting the Bible and determining how to act upon our interpretation. We try to take pieces of the Bible in their proper context and struggle with whether or not some parts of the Bible apply to modern life. On top of that, I do think that it is an important (but sticky!) business to distinguish which biblical messages are a description of the way things were versus a prescription for how things should be. (I must credit the pastor-author Paul Smith for that phrase.)

While there are many things about modern life that the writers of the Bible could not comprehend, many of us Christians believe that we should focus on relevant, consistent themes throughout the Bible ("love your neighbor", "care for the orphans", etc.) and use those themes to guide our approach to modern issues. And of course, the modern issue that seems to cause the greatest rift among the church and the childfree is reproduction and birth control.

As a Protestant, I don’t answer to the Roman Catholic church, so I completely divorce myself from any of the official Catholic teachings about reproduction and birth control. (This is not to show contempt to my Catholic sisters and brothers; it is a respectful disagreement. I acknowledge that those in service - priests, nuns, etc. - do not have children, and many Catholics do practice one form or another of family planning, but that is probably a discussion for another post.) Although there are some Protestants who range from hesitant to resistant to birth control, I would claim that as a whole - based on my own personal experiences in many churches in several parts of the world - the Protestant church does not generally have a problem with people using birth control. And when I talk about “the church,” I mean the people - not an organized body of leadership that lords over the masses or some man who gets some inflammatory work published.

I have found no prohibition of birth control in the Bible. In fact, the apostle Paul supports husbands and wives making a joint decision to refrain from sex for a specified time (I Cor. 7:5), which allows for birth control by means of abstinence. In my mind, it seems that if the Bible condones the only form of family planning that would have been available at that time, I cannot conclude that God would prohibit other forms of family planning that would be available in the future. (I would also point out that there is no verse in the Bible that specifically addresses abortion either, but I need to leave that topic alone for now.)

…behold, I am sending you out as lambs in the midst of wolves. -Luke 10:3

The painful spot I am in is that even though my own Christian cohorts have no objection to birth control, and even though most of my own Christian cohorts have no issue with my childfree status, being around church-folk does not give me any relief from the idolatry of pronatalism. Some look down on me for disliking children. At best, many think I’m strange; at worst, some do think I’m evil.

But when I go to the childfree community, I’m not fully accepted there either. Even when comments are not directed at me personally, it is hard to bear the rants against “fundies,” “born agains,” “anti-choicers,” and “religious nuts”; the mockery of people who “found Jesus”; or the equal-opportunity critics who disparage anyone “stupid” or “primitive” or “ignorant” or “unenlightened” enough to believe in a spiritual realm. Churched or childfree, there is every bit as much judgment and intolerance against those who have the audacity to believe differently. (And this is not to say that all or even most people in the childfree community hate religion. I have just run into it more often there than elsewhere lately.)

So here I stand, one foot in each of two cultures, neither culture willing to accept the things that I find most critical in my life. And what I hold to be greatest is derided not only by people I respect and with whom I hoped to identify, but by the secular culture in general. Still, I cannot help but feel that Jesus is nearby, looking on with compassion and saying, “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

For the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.”
Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, God decided, through the foolishness of our proclamation, to save those who believe.
For Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.
For God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness of is stronger than human strength. Consider your own call, brothers and sisters: not many of you were wise by human standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth.
But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to reduce to nothing things that are, so that no one might boast in the presence of God.
-I Corinthians 1:18-29

Childfree Confessions, #5 (the kid I do like)

There is actually one child I like, a 5-year-old whom I’ll call Anna. In fact, I spoke about her in a previous post: my friend’s child who is demanding and self-centered.

Ay carumba, is that girl a pistol! But for some reason, she and I have always had a connection. Perhaps it is because her mother and I were so close when Anna was born. Perhaps it is because she was one of the rare children about whom I could honestly say, “Oh, what a pretty baby.” Or perhaps it is because she is exceptionally intelligent. When she was between 2 and 3 years old, I recall being able to have a unexpectedly rational conversation with her. As she has grown and her communication skills have increased, I have found that she and I have many common interests such as reptiles, cats, insects, and anything science. On several occasions, I have been in stores that sell educational toys, and I always find things that I know Anna and I would love -- a terrarium in which to cultivate carnivorous plants, an ant farm, a kit for growing crystals.

Recently my friend noted in her facebook status that she was taking pictures of Anna’s preschool artwork. I commented, “Are you going to post them for us?” What? Did I just type that? Did I just express a genuine interest in some kid’s preschool artwork? Why, yes, I did. And when the work was posted, I looked through the album and made comments. “Tell Anna that I enjoyed looking at her pictures,” I added. (This gives me some hope that if my siblings ever have children, I can at least be a decent aunt. I have often worried about that, and I dread the day that my brother or sister calls me with the news.)

Even so, as much as I enjoy my occasional visits with Anna and express an interest in her life, I surely would not want to be her mother! Bless my friend for her patience.

Meerkat Manor

The Childfree Life has published another piece of my writing called "Watching 'Meerkat Manor' is Like Parenthood." In this essay, I poke a little fun at myself for my bizarre love-hate obsession with "Meerkat Manor," and I relate it to what I imagine my life would have been like if I'd had children.

This is also a bit of a play on another TCFL member's essay, "Visiting Wall Drug is Like Parenthood", so be sure to check out that one too.

I Don’t Want to Be...

…that kind of person. That is what I said about a certain type of parent in my last post. And coincidentally, just a few days after typing those words, I stumbled across someone who exemplified what I would not want to become. I saw an excerpt of her writing while perusing a childfree site, and I actually thought the author was being facetious. I went to the source site to see if this was intended to be serious (it was), and I was dumbfounded by the following quote: “You created life and forever more, you will nurture life. Mothers are almost God-like in that way. And when you carry that force out into the world, you will be awed by the power you have to effect change everywhere. You are now a mother in the world. All hail before you.”

I’ll be the first to admit that I sometimes think too highly of myself. But… wow… just, wow. After I recovered from reading the paragraph above, I remembered something that I recently read in Luke 11:27-28: As [Jesus] said these things, a woman in the crowd raised her voice and said to him, “Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts at which you nursed!” But he said, “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it!”

I found it fascinating that when someone praised the mother of our Savior for giving birth to and nursing him, he immediately shut the person down with the response that it was instead blessed for someone to keep the word of God. What an interesting set of priorities.

And this shall be my priority too. I know what I don’t want to be; instead, I do want to be the kind of person who hears and keeps the word of God.

More About Teenagers

I was at a party primarily for adults (there were a few children who had been relegated to another part of the house), and I was surrounded (blissfully) by people without young children: some childfree, some childless, and some parents of teens or adults. One of the mothers brought her 15-year-old daughter whom I’ll call Greta. Poor Greta was looking a little bored from feeling out of place -- a feeling I know all too well -- and since we now know that I like teenagers, I thought I would strike up a conversation with her. I found her to be a sweet, intelligent, and interesting young woman, and I enjoyed bringing her into the conversation.

To my dismay, however, every so often mom would chime in to either answer for Greta or to tell a story about her. For example, I asked Greta what her least favorite subject was at school. She paused to think for a moment, and her mother jumped right in to answer. I listened politely, but then I turned back to Greta to discuss the topic further.

This is a prime example of why I teach college rather than high school. Even though I encounter plenty of helicopter parents, there are still federal laws that support me in working with students and squeezing their intrusive parents out of the picture when appropriate. This situation is also another reason that I don’t want to be a parent: I don’t want to become that kind of person. (Though it isn’t just helicopter parenting. I also don’t want to develop that sense of entitlement, grandiose self-importance, single-mindedness, and self-centeredness that I witness in many parents. I have watched parenthood turn too many decent and interesting people into narcissistic boors.)

But getting back to my topic… If anyone has advice on how to lovingly, politely, and diplomatically let mom know that I want to hear what her daughter has to say, I would love to hear from you.

Childfree Confessions, #4 (teenagers)

I’m one of those rare people who likes teenagers. Obviously, not all teens -- some of them are disrespectful, irrational, or just plain mean. However, I think that most adolescents do not deserve to be painted with that stereotype.

When I was in college, I worked with the high school youth group at my church. Being shy and not a very good conversationalist, I don’t know that I was a particularly good youth worker, but I did enjoy it. I loved the energy of the teens, and I was quite fond of the girls who were in my small group.

More recently, I have worked with the InterVarsity Christian Fellowship club at my college, at times acting as club advisor or being the guest speaker at one of their group meetings. I have found the students to be receptive to what I have to say, and the students in turn have encouraged me on many occasions.

I think I may have an ability to reach out to the more difficult young people too. During my weekly volunteer work at the local humane society, I am often side-by-side with adolescents who have been sentenced to community service. I have the luxury of not being an authority figure to them, so I am often able to convince them to do something for me or coax some respect out of them more easily than their leaders can. I find that showing the kids some respect -- smiles and hello’s, thank-you’s and excuse-me’s -- truly does go a long way. Some of the kids ask me about my work there, and when they learn that I have been happily giving my time to the shelter every weekend for the past nine years, they seem to see more value in their work… if this lady does this because she wants to, maybe it’s not a “punishment” after all. I recall one incident where a girl complained and disparaged the work for several minutes. Finally, I approached her and very lovingly said, “Please don’t call this ‘ghetto work.’ [her words] What you are doing is really important, and the shelter appreciates it. And even though the animals can’t say it to you, they are grateful for it too. I’m a math professor, so I have a full-time job and don’t need to be here doing these things, but I come every week out of love and because I know it’s important. I just want you to feel good about what you are doing too.” Bless her heart, the girl’s attitude changed completely, and I didn’t hear another complaint. One of her leaders took me aside afterward and thanked me.

My admiration for adolescents and young adults has influenced my choice of profession as a community college professor, and I describe this in an article published on The Childfree Life this week (Why Do I Need a Child When I Already Have 100 'Kids'?). I feel that I get all the perks of being in the lives of those young people without all of the headaches of parenting.

If only I didn’t have to survive pregnancy and all of those early childhood years, perhaps I would have wanted to be a parent (though maybe someday I will be compelled to adopt). But now that I think about it, being a role model or mentor to the scores of teens that I have worked with and will work with is probably far more valuable to society than my being a parent and focusing my energies on just my own one or two kids.