Hale and Hearty Words

April 23, 2012 · 6:00 am

One Word to Sing

We’re going through a change at my church. Once again, we’re one man down on our pastoral team, and this time it’s the minister of music.

If you’ve been a member of any sort of church, you know how vital a music minister is.

So in this downtime, we’re adapting. One of the things that’s been done for the month of April is calling in local worship leaders Jonathan and Lisa Moore.

To have people so powerfully talented in our town is a HUGE blessing. They lead P&W all over the country as a ministry, and they happened to be available to fill in at our church for a month.

What.a.blessing. Did I mention?

My primary form of worship is through music. It moves me. It touches me. It brings me into the presence of our Lord like no other.

Here’s a taste of what Jonathan and Lisa can do from their album, Roots.

Sunday morning Jonathan and Lisa led us in a simple, slow, melodic song with the following lyrics:

A Wonderful God, A Wonderful God Is He
A Powerful God, A Powerful God Is He
A Marvelous God, A Marvelous God is He

Then Jonathan turned to the congregation and encouraged us to shout out the attributes of God. For each one that he heard, we sang as a church.

Hands lifted. Eyes closed. And in my case, tears flowed.

Healing.

Merciful.

Caring.

Gracious.

Forgiving.

The moment was beautiful and personal, yet as we joined in corporate worship, the spirit moved in me and others. God was inhabiting the praises of His people as we listed all the adjectives that describe Him.

Share with me: If you could only sing one word to God in praise to Him today, what word would you choose?

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Filed under The Christian Walk

April 20, 2012 · 6:00 am

Is It Okay To Make Your Child Face Their Fears?

Today I’m adding to the “Is It Okay to ___?” series and focusing on a parenting issue.

My oldest son had a fear of the vacuum.

I say had because he’s no longer scared of it.

He’s no longer scared of it because I made him vacuum.

But it wasn’t a pretty sight. He was screaming. He was crying. He was trying to push the vacuum and cover his ears from the noise at the same time.

(Okay, I realize that at this point some of you are probably freaking out, picking up your phones to call the authorities and report my parenting. But hang with me.)

My son had an irrational fear of the vacuum that developed only recently.

He used to love vacuum cleaners. Like, lo-ove them. In fact, when he was 2, we took him to see Santa. That year Santa was located in a shopping center that housed an Oreck vacuum store. Immediately after seeing Santa, my son requested that we take him to the vacuum store. We did. He was thrilled. So thrilled that he said it was better than Santa. He sat next to the stand-up cardboard cut out of the Oreck vacuum guy and we took his picture. He liked that better than having his picture made with Santa, he said.

Fast forward nearly four years. Suddenly the sound of the vacuum bothers his ears and causes him to act as if the machine has turned into a live crocodile.

“That’s too bad,” I say. “Because you’ve made a mess with your paper and scissors. Looks like a confetti machine exploded in here. You need to clean it up.”

“It’s too much to clean up with my fingers.”

“Fine,” I said. “You can vacuum.”

Commence with the waterworks and the mini-freak out.

I plugged the vacuum in. I said, “Son, I’m going to turn the vacuum on now and you are going to push it and vacuum up the mess you made.”

I switched the vacuum on. He screamed. Screamed.

I turned the vacuum off. I took my son by the shoulders and told him under no uncertain terms, “You are not allowed to be afraid of the vacuum. It can’t hurt you and you made a mess. You must now clean it up.”

I let him go, switched the vacuum on and put the handle in his hand. He shot me a look that I could read clearly, but I let it go because he was screaming, trying to cover his ears, and pushing the vacuum all at the same time.

And I’m sorry, but the scene in my house was hysterical. I tried to stifle a smile & my laughter because I didn’t want to upset him further. He was livid. Red with rage, screaming, crying, and probably the most upset I’ve ever seen him. But the emotions fueled him which made him push the vacuum faster, which made him realize that the vacuum was doing what it is made to do– suck up the mess, not eat small children.

He cleaned up the mess.

When he was finished he calmed down immediately. He admitted that using the vacuum wasn’t so bad.

And then he asked me if he could please vacuum the rest of the house for a dollar.

I call that success.

And I’m willing to part with a dollar if it means my son has conquered an irrational fear and my floors are clean.

I don’t know that telling him he’s “not allowed” be afraid of something was the best move, but that’s what I said in the moment, and praise God, that worked.

I don’t make light of my children’s fears. I never have. But in this case, I knew that an irrational fear would do him more harm than facing it and realizing that he’s more powerful than his fear.

I know that there are all different kinds of parents and all different styles of parenting, and this was my call with this particular situation in the moment. In a different situation, facing a different fear, I might not have pushed him. I certainly wouldn’t have thrown him into the deep end of a pool if he were afraid of water, for example. (Thankfully, he’s not. Swims like a fish.)

But I’d like to hear from you. What do you think about children and fear, rational or irrational?

(Jeannie Campbell, I’m waiting for your comment, LMFT.)

Share with me: Have you ever had to make your child face a fear? What was your outcome? What techniques do you think are effective?

16 Comments

Filed under Is It Okay To ____?, Parenting

Tagged as fear, parenting, vacuum

April 18, 2012 · 6:00 am

The Last Time You Had A First Kiss

The kiss. The magical moment when emotional entanglement becomes physical reality.

It’s intimate. It’s precious. It’s delightful. To most people, kisses are an indication of “I way more than like you.”

Books, movies, TV characters– Who doesn’t love the sigh at the release of tension when two people finally end up in the kiss you’ve been cheering them toward?

I was reading a book just the other day (thanks, Beth Vogt) where I was literally talking to the characters on the page. “Kiss her, you idiot!” 🙂 And when it happened, I was so, so happy.

My true first kiss occurred when I was 14. It was horrible. I’d rather block it out of my memory for all time and eternity. In fact, I almost have. It was none of the things described above, mostly because the teenage boy on the other end of the kiss was a total goon whom I barely knew. Ick. Let’s move on.

Thankfully I’ve had other first kisses. Some of them are still really important memories.

It was late–close to my curfew of midnight. I was nineteen, living with my parents, a freshman in college.

I’d just moved home from being away from school for a semester. I was fighting a chronic illness. I met a boy. He made me laugh. And it didn’t hurt that I thought he was super cute. He asked me out. We went to dinner and a movie on our first date. We went to see Collective Soul in concert in Atlanta for our second.

I didn’t let him kiss me on that first date. Apparently he tried on the second and I was either too naive or too absorbed in the concert to notice. (I’m going with being blonde and not noticing. I wasn’t new to being kissed.) By the third date I was way into this dude and I knew 2 things: 1. I definitely wanted him to kiss me. 2. He was The One.

Anyway, we were standing by the front door of my parent’s house chatting, killing time until that this is it moment. My “you’ll-appreciate-what-a-good-parent-I-am-someday” mother had already flashed the porch lights once; a warning that I needed to come in. I was just about to give up and head inside when it finally happened–he kissed me.

That was the last time I had a real first kiss. And it came from the man who is now my husband.

I remember all those feelings I had before “the moment”. The anticipation. The excitement. The truth that I really, really wanted him to kiss me. Thinking that if he didn’t, it probably didn’t bode well for future dates. And then when it happened, the sheer giddiness of knowing that he liked me enough to kiss me.

I’ll never forget that kiss.

It was late afternoon. I was dressed in white, surrounded by a zillion of my closest friends and family, in front of a minister who closely resembled an Oopma Loompa because of too many trips to the tanning bed. The previous few months of life had been chaos. I had finally had surgery to remove the tumor from my pituitary gland that had been the cause of my chronic illness over the previous three years. What’s more, I’d spend months in preparation for this moment. And it wasn’t perfect. But I no longer cared.

The pastor barely knew us. During the required counseling sessions before the big day, he’d insinuated that my guy and I weren’t a good match. I was not a fan of this pastor, but it was too late. We’d been attending the church for a year and a half and until our two-on-one time with him, thought he was a nice guy. And then he went and did it. The one-two punch to our wedding ceremony.

He read a terrible, horrible, awful poem AND he refused to say “you may kiss the bride”.

In that awkward moment of silence when I’m starting to feel beads of sweat because it’s my day and I don’t know what’s happening and the people in the church are starting to wonder, “isn’t this the part where the pastor tells the groom to kiss the bride?”, the man I was marrying took care of it. My hero. It came right after he wiped a happy “so-what-if-it-isn’t-perfect” tear from my cheek and made every woman in the church swoon. It was a sweet kiss. The kind that says, “you’re mine.” And we didn’t need a too-orange man to tell us that it was permissible.

I was a wife. Even though we’d shared plenty of kisses between our first and the one on our wedding day, it was the first kiss I shared with a man I could call my husband.

I’ll never forget that kiss.

But eleven years, two kids and a very hectic schedule later, there are days when the closest we get to a kiss is a peck on the cheek as one of us is running out the door.

You know how it is–after building a life together, you realize that some of the “magic” has been lost in the relationship. Some of the anticipation and excitement is gone. There’s no more mystery. You’re just too busy to worry about daily romance.

Yes, I said daily romance.

Want to get some of that spark back?

Have a first kiss.

How’s that possible, you might ask?

Everyday presents the opportunity for a first kiss. Not with a new partner each time–no, no. That’s not what I mean.

I’m talking about finding a reason to make your husband, wife or significant other feel special by initiating a “first” kiss.

Not a peck. Not a “see ya” swipe. Not accompanied by a list of tasks he or she needs to accomplish. No, I’m talking about a kiss that resembles the ones that are seared into your memory.

Tips for initiating a “first” kiss everyday:

Be intentional. Our favorite romance characters don’t kiss for no reason. Real kisses have real intentions behind them.
Devote more than 2 seconds to the action. A good kiss takes some time. A peck just ain’t gonna do it.
Don’t talk about it. Not before, not after. Just let it be what it is. You’ll kill the magic if you walk up to your spouse with a speech prepared. If you must say something, let it be “I’m going to kiss you now.” Then boom.
Don’t follow it up with other intimate actions. Again, just let the kiss be what it is. Kiss, walk away. Kisses are intimate enough as it is. Walking away from a good kiss will guarantee that your spouse will be thinking about you for the rest of the day.
Make the timing random. Don’t wait until your spouse is walking out the door or they expect some sort of physical touch from you. Catch him or her off guard. Sometimes the surprise of it can bring back some of that excitement.
Don’t look for a reason. Romance is about not having a reason other than your love. You don’t need a reason to let your spouse know how much you care.
Don’t expect to be kissed back. If it’s been a while since your last first kiss, it might take a few new “first” kisses for your spouse to realize that you’re being intentional. When that realization comes, though, I can guarantee you’ll see results of your intentional affection when that affection is returned.

Follow these tips for having a “first” kiss everyday and you might discover that your actions will quickly rekindle some of the excitement and anticipation of the early days of first kisses with your spouse.

Share with me: Who has the worst/best first kiss story or memory?