It was a light week as far as attendance goes. One was on vacation, and another was battling the “bug.” On another day one has difficulties with her eyes. On one day even I was absent for pre-surgical work ups. So it wasn’t a week for introducing new material. I had to keep up with the Math lessons, though. We did that in the morning, reviewed History in the afternoon, and then watched some history videos. There was plenty of time for getting work completed, especially their weekly packet called Daily Work.
Daily Work is Geography, Handwriting, and Vocabulary in small chunks for every day. The students are expected to work on these assignments during free time or at home each day. Each assignment takes less than 10 minutes, tops–if they daydream between questions.
Throughout the week, with all the gift of free time, I reminded the students that this was prime opportunity for working on Daily Work. By one chose to read a book or do whatever else instead. “Are you sure that’s what you want to do?” Oh, he was certain. He even promised that by Friday his completed Daily Work would be on my desk. He knew the consequences: Daily Work is graded.
On Friday we again had a large amount of free time after tests were completed, so I suggested once more he complete his Daily Work. He refused. Did he realize the consequence would be zeroes? He glared at me, then went on to some other work of his choosing.
By the end of the day his Daily Work was not on my desk. I reminded him of his promise to me earlier in the week, and told him I was now going to put those zeroes on his grades. “Thanks for making me feel bad!”
We like to do that, blame others for the misfortune of our own making. I didn’t let him remain there, but rather called him to be honest with himself. I asked him if he thought he’d tried his best to get his work completed. He at first said he had. So I reminded him of his responsibility to the assignment; his promise to me; and, the choices he’d made. It was tough to face. As he put it, “You just want me to say what you want to hear.” We don’t want to be honest even with ourselves. Finally, though, he admitted that he’d made the wrong choices and that he had not done his best to get his work completed.
It’s not easy calling children to be honest with themselves. They get angry and start tossing the blame around. It’s like dodging stray balls in a T-ball game. It’s all a part of their manipulation: Wait a sec. Let’s change the subject and make it about you!
All God’s children do that with their Heavenly Father. It’s a part of our Old Adam. Adam did it when God asked Him “Have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” His response was to blame God for the woman God had given him, “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree, and I ate.” So it was God’s fault Adam ate of the tree, not his own. One of the consequences of sin is we cannot be honest even with ourselves.
Satan offered Eve what she already had, to be in the image of God, and the result was Man is not in the image of another, the father of lies. Ken Korby used to say that the confessional is the only place a liar can tell the truth. However much truth there may be in that, it is still certain as Norman Nagel teaches that when we are finished with our confession, even for that there is much that requires repentance.
Showing posts with label Children. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Children. Show all posts
Saturday, May 01, 2010
Saturday, April 24, 2010
Offenses and Celebrations
He wanted to chatter about this-n-that. I’d asked him to get to his work. So I reminded him that his work needed his attention more than I needed his.
“I’m sorry if I offended you!” He said with as much attitude as a nine-year-old could muster.
So the manipulation war was on. That’s what it was. The focus was now on me for what I was doing and feeling. At first I was going to slough it off, “You didn’t offend me. Just get your work completed.” He growled at me.
Then I thought the better of it.
“You know what, you did offend me.” Now I had his attention completely, and it wasn’t pretty.
He hadn’t done what I asked him to do. It was a simple request: Do your work. At its completion, there would have been plenty of time for me to focus on what he wanted to tell me. But he chose to postpone his work by reversing the order, (a habit of his), causing me to issue a reminder to do his work. That irritated him, which made him lash out at me.
So yes, I was offended. For that, I forgave him.
He looked at me a full second. Then he smiled and said, “Thank you.” He went back to his work without another word.
This one needs to be prodded firmly. He’s so very bright that he sometimes out-manipulates himself. We are practicing Psalm 139 for the school closing. For whatever reason he can come up with, he won’t speak up with the rest of the group. He generally mumbles through. I know he knows the psalm. With only six in the class, they needed his help. Usually he says he’s afraid if he speaks too loudly he’ll drown out everyone else. We tell him to go ahead and be the leader of the pack! Yet, he’s still the silent one.
Yesterday he returned after a day’s absence with the “bug.” As we were walking to practice, he said he’d not be able to speak loudly because his stomach hurt still. To my mind I couldn’t see what the difference would be. The practice was dreadful. It seemed none of the children could recall the lines. So I decided to have another go after chapel. They agreed to “do their best.”
That’s all well and fine. I’m sure they all think they are doing their best, and I told them that. But there are other dimensions to doing and giving our best.
My disease is such that my future is not pretty. One day I will most likely wind up in a wheel chair or bedridden with someone changing my diapers. I told my students this. The day before we had planted some lilies, and they all worried about me bending over so much. I am in a “use it or loose it” situation. I have choices to make. I can choose to plant trees and lilies in gardens knowing full well that for days afterward I will hurt; I can exercise my body knowing that it hurts to do so; I can take long walks knowing that it hurts to do it; or I can do none of these things and lose the functions of my body more quickly even if I have my surgery. My not-too-pretty future comes sooner or later depending on whether or not I am willing to work through what hurts me now. And I can still say, “Well, I did my best.”
The beauty of the Christian life is that we don’t live it for ourselves, we live it for others. We aren’t reciting the psalm just to say words for ourselves, but for all those people who will be sitting in the pews. If legs ache, if tummies hurt, if throats are dry–all these things are just a teensy bit that will fly by and go away as soon as the psalm is said. What is important is that the people hear what God wants them to hear in the psalm. When we do our best for others, that’s a different kind of “best.”
It was the same thing for Jesus. He knew how much it would hurt to die, but He didn’t do it for Himself, He did it for you.
The children recited the psalm again, and excelled. This time, all six of them rang out with their voices. I asked my formerly silent one how it felt. “Not so good,” he said, “but great.” He was beaming.
They were all rewarded with special prize pencils.
“I’m sorry if I offended you!” He said with as much attitude as a nine-year-old could muster.
So the manipulation war was on. That’s what it was. The focus was now on me for what I was doing and feeling. At first I was going to slough it off, “You didn’t offend me. Just get your work completed.” He growled at me.
Then I thought the better of it.
“You know what, you did offend me.” Now I had his attention completely, and it wasn’t pretty.
He hadn’t done what I asked him to do. It was a simple request: Do your work. At its completion, there would have been plenty of time for me to focus on what he wanted to tell me. But he chose to postpone his work by reversing the order, (a habit of his), causing me to issue a reminder to do his work. That irritated him, which made him lash out at me.
So yes, I was offended. For that, I forgave him.
He looked at me a full second. Then he smiled and said, “Thank you.” He went back to his work without another word.
This one needs to be prodded firmly. He’s so very bright that he sometimes out-manipulates himself. We are practicing Psalm 139 for the school closing. For whatever reason he can come up with, he won’t speak up with the rest of the group. He generally mumbles through. I know he knows the psalm. With only six in the class, they needed his help. Usually he says he’s afraid if he speaks too loudly he’ll drown out everyone else. We tell him to go ahead and be the leader of the pack! Yet, he’s still the silent one.
Yesterday he returned after a day’s absence with the “bug.” As we were walking to practice, he said he’d not be able to speak loudly because his stomach hurt still. To my mind I couldn’t see what the difference would be. The practice was dreadful. It seemed none of the children could recall the lines. So I decided to have another go after chapel. They agreed to “do their best.”
That’s all well and fine. I’m sure they all think they are doing their best, and I told them that. But there are other dimensions to doing and giving our best.
My disease is such that my future is not pretty. One day I will most likely wind up in a wheel chair or bedridden with someone changing my diapers. I told my students this. The day before we had planted some lilies, and they all worried about me bending over so much. I am in a “use it or loose it” situation. I have choices to make. I can choose to plant trees and lilies in gardens knowing full well that for days afterward I will hurt; I can exercise my body knowing that it hurts to do so; I can take long walks knowing that it hurts to do it; or I can do none of these things and lose the functions of my body more quickly even if I have my surgery. My not-too-pretty future comes sooner or later depending on whether or not I am willing to work through what hurts me now. And I can still say, “Well, I did my best.”
The beauty of the Christian life is that we don’t live it for ourselves, we live it for others. We aren’t reciting the psalm just to say words for ourselves, but for all those people who will be sitting in the pews. If legs ache, if tummies hurt, if throats are dry–all these things are just a teensy bit that will fly by and go away as soon as the psalm is said. What is important is that the people hear what God wants them to hear in the psalm. When we do our best for others, that’s a different kind of “best.”
It was the same thing for Jesus. He knew how much it would hurt to die, but He didn’t do it for Himself, He did it for you.
The children recited the psalm again, and excelled. This time, all six of them rang out with their voices. I asked my formerly silent one how it felt. “Not so good,” he said, “but great.” He was beaming.
They were all rewarded with special prize pencils.
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Gifts and Satan and Candles and Menorahs
Christmas Break is here. I can finally sit back and take a breather myself for a few moments before things get nicely hectic with my children and four grandchildren in Little Rock. My “Second Family” of six children are off with their own families by now. We had a half-day at school yesterday following the annual Christmas Program, party, and gift exchange.
While having all the usual elements of a school Christmas Program, Pastor Sawyer’s sermon makes this rather something closer to a “Lutheran altar call.” He misses no chance to catechize parents in infant baptism, and this year presented a prime opportunity. Three of our students became older siblings recently. One of these infants is headed for Baptism; the other is sadly going to wait until he makes his own decision.
As pastor pointed out yesterday, the one thing that makes a gift a gift is that it is given. It surely can be accepted, rejected, exchanged, or returned, but the one thing a gift must be to be a gift is GIVEN. Even these tiny newborns will be given gifts this Christmas, some even from Santa.
Imagine a note from Santa:
Such a “Santa” might soon be known as “Satan.”
God through parents gives babies their first gift ever without them deciding that it should be theirs by accepting it. This is the gift of life. Babies are conceived and born without their permission. Can you imagine the poor mother whose child is slow in understanding what being born is all about or is not ready to accept his place in the world? “Mornin’ ma’am. How long’s it been you’ve rented that womb to your child? Eight years now?”
My Second Family understands this so clearly, primarily because they’ve been catechized every school day in the foundations of the Christian Faith, and by Christian I mean Lutheran. We pray the Catechism; we apply it to our lives in what we say and do. It becomes a part of who we are. By that it is the ABC’s of what we do and be.
The first week of Advent began as always. A young girl lights the menorah. In years when I have only boys, I will lights the candles. We read the passages to explain why we used this practice. In Jewish homes even now, Seder candles are lit by a female.
The continuity of the Old and New Testaments is made certain by Christ who said, You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, Jn 5:39. So, the Advent candle is lit from the menorah. John 1 identifies the Life who is Light of Men, (4-5); He is Creator (3,10); He is the Word of God(1); He is the Son of God who tabernacled among us(14).
And yet this Gift of God the Father was and is today rejected. John 1 says “the light shines forth and the darkness has not overcome it,” (5). Furthermore, even though He was in the world the world He created, His own creation and creatures “did not know did not recognize their own Creator (10). He came to His own people, and His own people did not receive Him, (11). Jesus spoke to the Jews of His day who claimed to be Children of Abraham doing what Abraham would do. “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life,”(8:11). Jesus told them that Abraham saw His day and rejoiced in it. There are some who have yet to do the same, but still claim to be Abraham’s Children. Others continue to lift up and look to Israel as a place of salvation for the world.
It is Christ who was lifted up for our sins. His Body and Blood is fed to us in the bread and wine He by which gives us Himself, and into our ears through which He comes by way of His words of forgiveness in the Absolution and preaching, and upon our heads in the water and Word. Rejection of God’s gift, or exchanging it for another results in a different way of salvation. “No thanks. No Jesus. I have another way.” Jesus told his hearers that those who rejected Him were of another father (8:44). My Second Family has no trouble at all understanding that anyone who does not have Christ as his Savior cannot have God as His Father; and where God the Father and His Son are, there the Holy Spirit is, too.
That took care of the first week. The second week dawned icon and one of my students asked, “What next? We need more.” So we searched about and one of them looked at the display of icons on the wall and said, “That one! We need to know that one means.” It was the Tree of Jesse icon. Jesse sleeps at the root, the Theotokos and her Son rest in the middle of the tree which springs from him. Twelve prophets sit in four branches, each holding an item identifying himself and his prophesy of Christ.
In the next few days I hope to write for you what was presented to my Second Family. A blessed Advent to you all!
While having all the usual elements of a school Christmas Program, Pastor Sawyer’s sermon makes this rather something closer to a “Lutheran altar call.” He misses no chance to catechize parents in infant baptism, and this year presented a prime opportunity. Three of our students became older siblings recently. One of these infants is headed for Baptism; the other is sadly going to wait until he makes his own decision.
As pastor pointed out yesterday, the one thing that makes a gift a gift is that it is given. It surely can be accepted, rejected, exchanged, or returned, but the one thing a gift must be to be a gift is GIVEN. Even these tiny newborns will be given gifts this Christmas, some even from Santa.
Imagine a note from Santa:
“Dear Baby,
I have a gift for you, but you are too young to accept it or even understand why it is given to you or what it means. So I can’t give it to you until you are older.
Love,
Santa”
Such a “Santa” might soon be known as “Satan.”
God through parents gives babies their first gift ever without them deciding that it should be theirs by accepting it. This is the gift of life. Babies are conceived and born without their permission. Can you imagine the poor mother whose child is slow in understanding what being born is all about or is not ready to accept his place in the world? “Mornin’ ma’am. How long’s it been you’ve rented that womb to your child? Eight years now?”
My Second Family understands this so clearly, primarily because they’ve been catechized every school day in the foundations of the Christian Faith, and by Christian I mean Lutheran. We pray the Catechism; we apply it to our lives in what we say and do. It becomes a part of who we are. By that it is the ABC’s of what we do and be.
The first week of Advent began as always. A young girl lights the menorah. In years when I have only boys, I will lights the candles. We read the passages to explain why we used this practice. In Jewish homes even now, Seder candles are lit by a female.
The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shined, Is 9:2.God promised His Seed would come through a woman (Ge 3:15), so the darkness would be overcome by that Seed.
The continuity of the Old and New Testaments is made certain by Christ who said, You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me, Jn 5:39. So, the Advent candle is lit from the menorah. John 1 identifies the Life who is Light of Men, (4-5); He is Creator (3,10); He is the Word of God(1); He is the Son of God who tabernacled among us(14).
And yet this Gift of God the Father was and is today rejected. John 1 says “the light shines forth and the darkness has not overcome it,” (5). Furthermore, even though He was in the world the world He created, His own creation and creatures “did not know did not recognize their own Creator (10). He came to His own people, and His own people did not receive Him, (11). Jesus spoke to the Jews of His day who claimed to be Children of Abraham doing what Abraham would do. “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life,”(8:11). Jesus told them that Abraham saw His day and rejoiced in it. There are some who have yet to do the same, but still claim to be Abraham’s Children. Others continue to lift up and look to Israel as a place of salvation for the world.
It is Christ who was lifted up for our sins. His Body and Blood is fed to us in the bread and wine He by which gives us Himself, and into our ears through which He comes by way of His words of forgiveness in the Absolution and preaching, and upon our heads in the water and Word. Rejection of God’s gift, or exchanging it for another results in a different way of salvation. “No thanks. No Jesus. I have another way.” Jesus told his hearers that those who rejected Him were of another father (8:44). My Second Family has no trouble at all understanding that anyone who does not have Christ as his Savior cannot have God as His Father; and where God the Father and His Son are, there the Holy Spirit is, too.
That took care of the first week. The second week dawned icon and one of my students asked, “What next? We need more.” So we searched about and one of them looked at the display of icons on the wall and said, “That one! We need to know that one means.” It was the Tree of Jesse icon. Jesse sleeps at the root, the Theotokos and her Son rest in the middle of the tree which springs from him. Twelve prophets sit in four branches, each holding an item identifying himself and his prophesy of Christ.
In the next few days I hope to write for you what was presented to my Second Family. A blessed Advent to you all!
Sunday, February 18, 2007
School Scholarships/Vouchers
One of my nephews is diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome. This means he falls into the range of diagnoses for autism, but he is high functioning. His parents have struggled to find him schooling and therapies. Not every private or public school is anxious to see him walking through the door. Recently his mother locked up her business, and his father relocated his so they could move across state to a school district where he could be enrolled in a school that provided services for him. Not all children with his developmental disability are able to enjoy such privileges. If the school he currently attends should restructure or lose funding for his services in the future, his education may be threatened.
These
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