Guest Post: Stuff Christian's Like
A Christian Housewife's thoughts on a little bit of everything.
We are going on a trip tomorrow. And by we I mean just me and the girls (I have 3 under 5). We will be gone for a month. I have opted to use disposable diapers while gone. In the past I have done these trips both ways (cloth or disposable, usually disposable for sort trips and cloth for long) and really cloth isn't that big of under taking. But this go around there are more children, my husband can't come, and I am not well going to visit family members that are even sicker. So we are doing disposable. I hate disposable. They are flimsy and leak and cause rashes. Does it seem at all right to anyone else that food products have to list all of their ingredients but not diapers? I mean these are chemicals that we are putting next to the most sensitive parts of babies for 24 hours a day for something like 3 years. Shouldn't we get to know what those chemicals are? And what chemicals are going to the landfills for that matter? And if you are advertising your product as "natural wipes" all of the ingredients you use should be pronounceable by people even if they don't have chemistry degrees.
And that I had a funny blog. But I am just not, and I don't. I do better with passion and critique than humor. And while I might say something sarcastic on here ever now and then that warrants a chuckle, this blog certainly isn't laugh out loud funny. Maybe I should start posting clips from "The Big Bang Theory" on here, then you would laugh. That show is fantastic. But in the mean time, this blog might be getting temporarily funnier. Jon Acuff, the man behind the curtain over at Stuff Christian Like has offered to guest post on peoples blogs in the advance of his up coming book release. (The book sounds great, looking forward to reading it). He made the offer for anyone- whether you have 2 readers or 200, which I think is pretty cool. You can find a link to his site on my side bar under "it's funny 'cause it's true" which it is. Evangelical Christendom as a sub-culture can be pretty amusing when you stop to think about it and I think it is good to be able to laugh at yourself. So stay tuned. My thoughts about the stay art home daughter movement are also forth coming. Just in case you don't like to laugh. In the mean tim, add Jon to you RSS feed, his blog is a great blend of humor, insight, love (for lack of a better word). Anyway, go read. He actually posts regularly.
In December I had so many things I wanted to write about: further thoughts on children, on marriage, thoughts about Advent, about the Theotokos (mother of God) and evangelical fear of her, and just a general "family update." None of that happened. Oh well. We had a wonderful December all the same, and January has been very crazy.
The title of my blog is To Love, Honor, and Obey. Obviously you know that already. My point is that I chose it for a reason. It is what I vowed on my wedding day, and very purposely vowed at that. The pastor performing the ceremony (my pastor from growing up, but who had since moved away and most pre-ceremony planning was done via email) was very against using the phrase. Or if I was going to say obey then we should both say obey. I would have loved to have an in depth conversation about it with him, pouring over scripture together, and who knows maybe even coming to his same conclusion- but he didn't bring the objection up till about 5 min before I walked down the isle (and based the objection on a more cultural view point rather than the Bible), so alas there wasn't much conversation to be had. :) Which was fine. Ultimately when it come to wedding vows I think a person needs to pick them for themselves- afterall it is what YOU are vowing to do and be for as long as you both shall live. It is pretty weighty stuff. So to included or not to include a phrase because it is popular or not popular is silly. But so is to include something just because it is traditional. Like the word Obey. Really what is meant is "submit" not obey. Most modern couples who use the word obey in their vows are referencing the verses that tell "wives submit to your husbands as unto the Lord". These verses don't say "obey your husbands" and I think if that was what was meant then that is what would be used because in most passages addressing this issue children are told to obey their parents as is fitting in the Lord. The command to obey seems to me to be something different than submit. Now, at this point I am not sure what the nuances are, but I think it is likely significant that children are told in multiple places to obey but never to submit and wives are told to submit but never told to obey. I'm still trying to work all this out in my mind.
Because it isn't really fair to spend a whole post critiquing a philosophy without putting forth my own for critique, I bring you this post. But as a brief disclaimer I don't have this all worked out in detail and am still very much in process. This is most definitely not meant to tell anyone else how to raise their children. That is between you and God.
Your children, O Christian parent, want a Peace and have ample time to perceive it in you. If you have it, Peace not merely placidity, do you know why and can you communicate that why? If they want to be like you (does anyone want to be like you?), they will want to know and they will follow.
(As an aside: they don't want denominational/orthodox peace first and foremost so don't base the home order on catechizing. They need to see you satisfied by the Love of God, obedient by grace not Law, loving your neighbor as yourself, living by reason not passion).
I love this offering from C.S. Lewis. I love pretty much all things Lewis, but this ranks as one of my favorites. I think it is very applicable to the discussion on parenting.
It may be possible for each to think too much of his own potential glory hereafter; it is hardly possible for him to think too often or too deeply about that of his neighbour. The load, or weight, or burden of my neighbour’s glory should be laid daily on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the backs of the proud will be broken. It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendours. This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously—no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption. And our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner—no mere tolerance or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment. Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbour is the holiest object presented to your senses. If he is your Christian neighbour he is holy in almost the same way, for in him also Christ vere latitat—the glorifier and the glorified, Glory Himself, is truly hidden.”
Labels: Christianity, God, Marriage, parenting, Sanctification
Parenting. Big Topic. Important topic. At times, a controversial topic. This will be one of those times. Especially since I want to talk mostly about why I find one approach that I see very troubling. Which I will admit is the easy way. So much safer to pick apart some other philosophy than to put your own up for scrutiny. So in fairness I will do that as well, but for now I have a bone to pick.
Labels: parenting
Amenyah Zuriel 2/13/2008
truly YHWH, God is my strength
I believe in the Holy Shores of Uncreated Light.
I believe there is power in the Blood.
And all of the death there ever was, if you sat it next to life;
I believe it would barely fill a cup.
For I believe there's power in the blood.
~Andrew Peterson, "Lay Me Down"
When peace, like a river, attendeth my way, When sorrows like sea billows roll; Whatever my lot, Thou has taught me to say, It is well, it is well, with my soul.
It is well, with my soul, It is well, with my soul, It is well, it is well, with my soul
Though Satan should buffet, though trials should come, Let this blest assurance control, That Christ has regarded my helpless estate, And hath shed His own blood for my soul.
It is well, with my soul, It is well, with my soul, It is well, it is well, with my soul
My sin, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought!
My sin, not in part but the whole,
Is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more,
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul!