Repost

In the spirit of the holidays I'm reposting something I wrote back in April explaining my position on holiday issues.

I had a conversation with my best friend recently about holidays and how we were choosing to celebrate them. Since becoming a parent a couple of months ago I have realized that Nathan and I need to be very intentional with our actions and words around a holiday. I mean an important holiday, not like Flag Day or the 4th of July. I'm talking about Christmas, and Easter and Thanksgiving... the important Christian high holidays. Especially Christmas and Easter. Our conversation was about these two particular holidays and how we were going to present them to our children. She had really been thinking about what she was going to tell her son about Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny. Should she let him believe in them or not? If not, to what extent should he know about them? She was telling me during the course of the conversation that she and her husband took their son to an Easter egg hunt, and encouraged me to find an Easter egg hunt near us to take Derek to, even if he wasn't old enough to understand really, she thought it would be a fun family activity. When I told her that Nathan and I didn't really want to introduce him to Easter egg hunts or let him participate in them there was a short silence on the other end of the phone before she said "well it's not a sin to take your kid to an Easter egg hunt." She is right. It is not a sin to take your kid to an Easter egg hunt. It is not a sin to let your kid participate in one. But Nathan and I believe very strongly that Easter is the most important holiday in the Christian faith! It is even more important than Christmas because Easter is the day that the Lord Jesus rose again and completed his act of saving us from our sin! Without Easter we would have a dead god just like the rest of the false world religions. Without Easter there would be no propitiation for sin because Jesus would not have been God, but just a man. To detract from the awe and worship we should have in our hearts on this day by going on a silly pointless egg hunt or talking about a stupid rabbit would be wrong! We as believers should only have eyes for the Lord this day! We should have ourselves so fixated on the power of the cross and the resurrection that we don't care about candy eggs and bunnies. I can't stress enough how much I want my home to be rejoicing in the resurrection, and let's be honest, what child is thinking about the empty tomb while on an Easter egg hunt? Derek will not think "Gee, I'm really glad Jesus is risen" while searching for eggs. No, he will be thinking "I want candy!" Any normal child would. Easter is not about "I want candy." Easter is about "The Lord is Risen!" and that is the sound I want to hear in my house. So, no, while I don't feel there is anything inherently wrong in going on an Easter egg hunt in an of itself, I feel that it is wrong to detract from the glory Jesus should be getting on this day.

Now, the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus are a whole other matter entirely. Not only do both of these entities detract from the glory God should be getting on their respective holidays, but I believe there is a measure of sin in allowing your children to believe in them. Here is why... there is not one parent out there who's children believe in Santa who has not lied to them to perpetuate that belief. Whether it's an outright lie, or simply a lie of omission. At first it seems harmless when the kids are little and it does not take much work to allow them to believe in Santa. They go to bed fairly early on Christmas Eve, so mom and dad have plenty of time to get the presents under the tree, and they don't ask a lot of questions. But think about this, every parent who has written a letter to Santa for their young child has lied to them. They have simply not told them the truth, which is the same as a lie. They have perpetuated a deception. As the kids get older, it gets harder and harder to perpetuate the belief. Mom and Dad have to start getting up in the middle of the night to put the presents under the tree, or worse, the older child wants to sleep on the couch hoping to catch a glimpse of Santa, so mom and dad have to sneak around absolutely silently lest they wake the child and shatter their belief. Some older children may even begin to ask questions to which a parent has to outright lie in their answer to perpetuate the belief. Then finally one day, the child really is too old to believe in that stuff so he says to his mom, "Mommy, is Santa real?" "No honey, he's not." "Mommy, is the Easter Bunny real?" "No honey, it's not." "Mommy, is the Tooth Fairy real?" "No honey, she's not." Now that the child's whole belief system has been tragically shattered in one conversation, he asks one more tentative question. "Mommy, is Jesus real?" "Yes, honey, Jesus is real." And he is supposed to take my word for it??? You see, not only has the child's belief system been yanked out from under him, but his trust in me has also been crushed. Not permanently I suppose, but for that point in time, and maybe for some time after he may struggle to believe the Bible stories I tell him, after all I told him a lot of stories about Santa too. For this reason, it's dangerous to perpetuate belief in these non existent entities. It is far better for a child to know the truth from the beginning so there will never be a question of what is true and what isn't. Even if that means that the child will miss out on the "fun" of believing in Santa or the Easter Bunny. (Truth be told, I never believed in those things and I didn't feel that I missed out on anything, except being lied to by my parents, which I wouldn't have wanted anyways!)

These are really just the things we have decided for our family. I'm not going to condemn anyone who decides that Santa and the Easter Bunny are fine for their children to believe in. I am going to challenge them to really think about that decision though in the context of Scripture to see if that is the God glorifying decision, or if they're letting the world influence them.

Holidays

Once again the holidays are upon us and I am so excited. The past few years, the holidays have felt dull and unexceptional. I think that once you get older Christmas can lose some of the magic if you're not careful. Nathan and I have been incredibly guilty of just cruising through the holidays. That's been partially because of life circumstances. Our first Christmas as a married couple we spent by ourselves with no gifts (or one gift per person) and mainly spent the day dreading working our crazy retail jobs the day after. Three years ago we spent Christmas driving all over the country trying to visit everyone. Insane. Two years ago we both worked high pressure jobs that demanded our full attention. There wasn't a lot of time for holiday reflections. Last year I was VERY pregnant and had been laid off and spent most of the holiday season fighting for my unemployment benefits and sleeping on the couch. We barely got the tree up in time for Christmas. So that brings us to this year. This year will be different. This year the magic is already back. This year we have a child. I am excited beyond words for Derek's first Christmas. I am thrilled that he will be old enough to enjoy Christmas this year. he will have fun ripping paper off of his presents. He will play with the toys he is getting. He will stare at the Christmas tree in wonder. He will watch us build our family traditions this year. We have not placed a lot of emphasis on building our traditions, so this year we feel it is very important to do so. Here are some of the traditions we want to incorporate:
-Reading of the Christmas story and singing of Christmas carols as a family on Christmas Eve (either before or after the Christmas Eve service depending on the time of the service)
-Day after Black Friday decorating (not possible this year because we are not home!)
- Letting Derek put the star on the tree
-Opening each day of the advent calendar
-Saluting Nathan's Jewish heritage with a non-traditional Hanukkah nod
- setting up the nativity set (that we do not have yet!) and explaining the Christmas story to Derek as we do.

There are several traditions that will NOT be part of our holiday too. Things like Santa, and over commercialization have no place in our home. Instead we want our traditions to be Christ centered and family centered. Noel Piper (wife of Pastor John Piper) wrote a book called Treasuring God in Our Traditions that I LOVE and highly recommend to people looking to build family traditions. Anyone interested can find it and other books at this link: http://www.desiringgod.org/Store/Books/ByTopic/All/859_For_Mom/

With all that said, I hope everyone has a WONDERFUL Thanksgiving. I am thankful beyond words for my husband who is patient with me and loves me unconditionally; for my son who is the biggest blessing I've ever received and is responsible for growing me in Christ and stretching me. He is beautiful and I love him with all my heart. And above all, I will never stop being thankful to Jesus Christ for what He accomplished on the cross and in His resurrection.

Have a great Thanksgiving everyone!

Convention on the Rights of the Child

Ok, my friend Marci sent me this link and I think it's really important for all my parents who read this out there to visit it. It's in regards to the UN's Convention on the Rights of the Child, which I understand to be an actual document that would take away parents' rights if ratified in the US. I've copied and pasted below 20 things you need to know about the CRC. Please read!!! It's really pretty scary!

20 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THE UN CONVENTION ON THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILD

Ten things you need to know about the structure of the CRC:

• It is a treaty which creates binding rules of law. It is no mere statement of altruism.^1.
• Its effect would be binding on American families, courts, and policy-makers.^2.
• Children of other nations would not be impacted or helped in any direct way by our ratification.^3.
• The CRC would automatically override almost all American laws on children and families because of the U.S. Constitution’s Supremacy Clause in Article VI.^4.
• The CRC has some elements that are self-executing, while others would require implementing legislation. Federal courts would have the power to determine which provisions were self-executing.^5.
• The courts would have the power to directly enforce the provisions that are self-executing.^6.
• Congress would have the power to directly legislate on all subjects necessary to comply with the treaty. This would constitute the most massive shift of power from the states to the federal government in American history.^7.
• A committee of 18 experts from other nations, sitting in Geneva, has the authority to issue official interpretations of the treaty which are entitled to binding weight in American courts and legislatures. This effectively transfers ultimate authority for all policies in this area to this foreign committee.^8.
• Under international law, the treaty overrides even our Constitution.^9.
• Reservations, declarations, or understandings intended to modify our duty to comply with this treaty will be void if they are determined to be inconsistent with the object and purpose of the treaty.^10.

Ten things you need to know about the substance of the CRC:

• Children would have the ability to choose their own religion while parents would only have the authority to give their children advice about religion.^13.
• The best interest of the child principle would give the government the ability to override every decision made by every parent if a government worker disagreed with the parent’s decision.^14.
• A child’s “right to be heard” would allow him (or her) to seek governmental review of every parental decision with which the child disagreed.^15.
• According to existing interpretation, it would be illegal for a nation to spend more on national defense than it does on children’s welfare.^16.
• Children would acquire a legally enforceable right to leisure.^17.
• Christian schools that refuse to teach "alternative worldviews" and teach that Christianity is the only true religion "fly in the face of article 29" of the treaty.^18.
• Allowing parents to opt their children out of sex education has been held to be out of compliance with the CRC.^19.
• Children would have the right to reproductive health information and services, including abortions, without parental knowledge or consent.^20.
• Parents would no longer be able to administer reasonable spankings to their children.^11.
• A murderer aged 17 years and 11 months and 29 days at the time of his crime could no longer be sentenced to life in prison.¹²

Citation: from www.parentalrights.org

You can click on the link above to visit the site and see the footnotes for these 20 things as well as get more information!

Kansas

Well, we arrived in Kansas safely last Monday, and sent my mom home on Tuesday. We are trying our best to get settled in our temporary housing while we wait on our paperwork from the bank to go through on our house. We don't have a closing date yet but I am praying fervently for the end of this month. I feel off tonight. There have been some great times since moving here, but tonight feels sad to me. Derek isn't feeling well, and maybe that's why but tonight I feel like I want to go home more than I have the whole time I've been here. *sigh* Anyway, Derek is definitely getting tooth number two. Stinks cuz he just got tooth number one and I was hoping that he was done for at least a couple weeks. Oh well. Here we go again. I don't have much more to say really. I just thought I'd post an update for all of you back home who read this (and those who aren't at home and read this too!) I'll write more soon, and I hope it will be more interesting!!

Today....

Today is my last day living in Minnesota. Here are the things I want to do today;

Get cheese curds at Burnsville Center
Ride on the motorcycle with Dad
Take a walk with Mom
Go to the zoo
Take Derek to see the airplanes

Don't know if I'll make it to all these, but I'd like to try!

September...

Well, September is upon us and with it comes the reality of what I am doing in two weeks. We are packing up our home and moving to Kansas. Nathan accepted a youth pastor position in Kansas and so we are off to a new place to live in two weeks. I cannot lie and say that I am excited. (Sorry everyone from down there reading this!) I have absolutely zero desire to leave Minnesota and leave my parents and sister, and leave my church, and leave my small group and all the friends I have there... I have been living in denial for about a month, but I can't any longer. I have started saying my goodbyes and started doing things for the last time. Last time going to MOA, last time eating at Frankie's, last time going to the Science Museum, last time going to the zoo... so many last times.... I can't even begin to think of what life will be like down there. I imagine that it will be pretty boring at first. Maybe for a long time. I don't know. Really, I do apologize to people from down there who might be reading this. I want you to know that it's nothing against you or your town. I just am having a hard time with leaving. I have never even tried to picture myself living in a small town, and all I can envision is me sitting around my house all day cleaning cooking and taking care of Derek. Also not the life I wanted. I do that here, but I also get the chance to get out besides going to Walmart. I have friends here with kids who go to the zoo with me and mall walk with me in the winter. I just hate losing that. I hate feeling like I'm losing my life. I'm going to miss everything from mall walking with my mom to actually getting date nights with Nathan because I have a babysitter here. I'm not all negative about the move. I mean we have bought a house down there that I really like, but that has done nothing to outweigh the sorrow I feel. I wanna go back to ignoring the impending move. I wanto to go back to having more time. I want to go back to June before all this happened. And now I have nothing more to say. So I'm \just going to end it. Sorry I am so depressing tonight, but this is my blog, and I just had to get my stuff out there. It's driving me crazy just sitting in my head all the time! :)

Parenting advice from People Who Don't Have Kids!

Ok, so that title is bad, but this is going to be more about parenting than about the frontal issue. Keep reading, you'll understand.

I was watching the Tyra Show this afternoon. I never watch daytime tv because it's usually all crap, but a teaser for today's show hooked me and I decided to tune in. Part of today's show included a 14 year old girl who has a MySpace page on which she displays risque pictures of herself, has sex with a different boy every Saturday night, may possibly be pregnant and was going to reveal all of this to her mother. They brought her unsuspecting mother out onto the stage and as the girl revealed each secret the mom's perfect plaster face remained unchanged. After a moment the mother asks the inevitable question: "why?" the girl says she doesn't like herself she has low self esteem, she does it to feel wanted loved and beautiful (she sure sounded like a couselor coached her in this answer!) and that she wishes she could have a closer relationship with her mother. The mom says "well I'm not the one who's changed." To which a counselor in the audience replies that instead of taking that approach the mother should reach out to her daughter. Tyra asks what they are going to do when they get home now that all that's out in the open, and the mother responds that there will be punishment along the lines of some grounding and loss of priviledges. Tyra gives the mother this advice: "I actually think that it's very important that she told you the truth. I think your trust in her needs to go up not down because she revealed this to you."

Ok, I want to take a breif look at what's wrong with this whole segment. First of all is the obvious issue. We have a 14 year old girl who is sleeping around, having unprotected sex and may possibly be bringing a baby into the world. A baby having a baby. But what really astounded me about this whole segment was the mother. First of all, she's clueless. She has made some really bad parenting choices. She has allowed her daughter to run amuck on the internet unsupervised. This mother didn't even know that her daughter had a MySpace page. What teenagager doesn't have a MySpace or Facebook page? Instead of becoming involved in her daughter's life, this mother chose the path of detachment and distance. She claimed at one point that she and her daughter had talked about sex and choices. The daughter responded "a long time ago you told me what sex was..." The mother had obviously figured she had done her job and left it at that. The mother demonstrated further cluelessness when she asked, "Why didn't I know about this? How could I have missed this?" The daughter responded "it was easy. I just told you I was going to someone's house overnight." Meaning that clearly the mother never checked to make sure her daughter was where she said she would be. She never called the supposed friend's parents. She never kept her daughter accountable for being where she said she would be. Parents: Don't be this clueless!! Set boundaries for your child's internet activities. Check the history! Make them give you their passwords for email and MySpace and Facebook! The parenting "experts" would have you believe that this is a violation of your child's privacy. It is GOOD PARENTING!!! Make sure your child is where they say they will be. Call the friend's parents to make sure they are aware of weekend plans. Get to know their friends and when possible the parents. Your child will hate you, but you will be involved. When your child has demostrated responsibilty you can reward them by letting out the leash. My point here is don't wait for your daughter to reveal her promiscuity on the Tyra Show. Take preemptive action to make sure your children learn responsible behavior!

What really got me though was Tyra's advice at the end of the segment. The mother indicates that she's going to be a parent (finally) and punish the daughter for her actions and Tyra thinks that instead of that the mother should trust her daughter more. Sure, lady. Let the leash out more. Oh wait, it's already nonexistent. So in other words, now that the daughter has told her mother what's going on, the mother should nod, accept it and allow the daughter to continue life as usual? Sure. That's great advice Tyra. Word to the wise Tyra, you shouldn't EVER give parenting advice when you are childless yourself. You come off as stupid and having no idea what you're talking about!