Jackson is 8 months old. He crawls around on the floor. He pulls himself up on things to stand up. He coos, squeals, grunts, and makes endless raspberries. He’s the perfect size for Megan (10) and Paul (8) to pick up and play with. He loves to cuddle with mom and dad.
Eight months is one of those ages you wish your kids could just freeze and stay… forever.
This is the tension we live in as parents, isn’t it? We want them to slow down so we can enjoy each stage of development.
But they are in a hurry to grow up
Jackson wants to use real words to tells us exactly what he wants. He wants to not just stand up, but walk. He wants to run with his siblings. He wants to eat what we eat.
He wants to get big and we want to keep him small.
It’s cute when they are babies. Certainly understandable and easy to justify.
But this tug to keep them young isn’t always good for them
The other day I hung out with Ryan McRae, a resident director at CSU San Marcos. He sees this same phenomenon every day with 18, 19, 20 year olds whose parents have done their best to keep their children young. Many of them are ill-equipped to live on their own. They lack basic judgment skills. Lots of them can’t even cook for themselves or do their own laundry.
Young adults who can’t take care of themselves. They can’t resolve conflict among themselves. He has to tell the parents to leave their adult-aged children alone.
I’m not a psychologist… but when I hear these things my mind wonders, “Are these young adults developmentally delayed?” Yes.
It’s cute to keep a baby young. But its not helpful to them beyond toddlerhood.
As parents we want to hold on to that cute baby who crawls around on the floor and coos. But, to be a good parent, we need to own our role in raising our children to become responsible, respectable adults. The goal of your parenting can not be to hold onto the past. It has to be to prepare your kids for the future.
JT has fit into our family from the first moment. We never knew he was missing from the family make-up until he invited himself to the party. He completes our little family.
This baby is proof that there are no accidents in God’s eyes, just emerging possibilities.
When an emerging possibility rocks you world, throw your hands in the air and enjoy the ride. His way is way more fun than your way.
It’s hard to remember what our family was like without him.
The fun part about Jackson, to us, is how much of an unexpected miracle he is to our family. With both Megan and Paul we carefully planned their arrival. I remember sitting down with Kristen and doing the math with the calendar about a year before she was born– “If Megan is born on May 12th, that will be the day after my last final. That will give us the best opportunity to spend the most time with her before classes begin.” With Jackson, the element of surprise changed everything. Even today we laugh thinking about having a 3rd baby. He wasn’t in the plan. He just showed up!
One thing I’ve noticed with Jackson that I didn’t notice with the other two is that a new baby isn’t just a joy for its parents and immediate family, he brings joy to every corner of our community. You see it on the faces of people everywhere we go with him! His arrival literally makes people smile.
Infectious Joy
Our extended family loves seeing him.
Our neighbors love seeing him.
People in our neighborhood who saw Kristen walking while she was pregnant stop her now to see him and smile.
People at church love seeing him.
People at both of our jobs love seeing him.
Long time friends from all over the world love seeing his pictures on Facebook.
The kids classmates and other random people at the kids school love seeing him.
The guy at our favorite smoothie shop loves seeing him.
Random people whom we barely know, stop us in public, because they love seeing him.
People we’ve never met but are our Facebook friends and Twitter followers love seeing him.
He is a joy machine!
One little baby has brought joy, spontaneous joy, to any entire group of people. I’m thankful to God for allowing me to observe it this time.
You are a joy machine, too
I’ve started to think about this observation in light of other people in my life. At one point you brought Jackson-like joy to your community. People oogled over you at the grocery store. Your parents neighbors counted down the days until you were born. People your parents barely knew smiled when they pushed a stroller around your block.
The same is likely true of you today. Even if you don’t see it– you bring joy to your community. People look forward to seeing you. Your impact isn’t just in your work or in the people you think it is, it’s so much deeper and wider than you can imagine. The guy at the smoothie shop (or coffee shop) you go to regularly looks forward to seeing you every day.
The last 48 hours have been filled with God’s presence. Little moments of stillness amidst the storm of welcoming a new baby in which God whispered in our ear gentle reminder:
“You are Mine.”
“Jackson is Mine.”
“I’m in charge.”
The change started Tuesday morning as the sun came up. In the 24 hours preceding we had been in the hospital trying to get labor going nothing had happened. Like literally, we progressed backwards!
We fell asleep exhausted, frustrated, and discouraged. We woke up refreshed, optimistic, and encouraged.
I turned on the lights and I changed the music in our room to a playlist I call, “All U2, All Crowder, All the Time.”
That little room reset set in motion a series of things where God loudly presented His voice.
First, the nurses examined Kristen. A 25 year veteran and then the senior nurse on the ward both said… “I’ve never felt anything like that. I have no idea what that means or what’s going on.”
We laughed. And both Kristen and I soaked in the reality that it wasn’t just that Kristen was a newfound medical mystery– it was that God was going to reveal Himself in an unexpected way.
Then, the doctor came in. She answered all of our questions and was matter-of-fact about what was going to happen. His head was too big to be born
As the hours progressed our anxiety about the realities of how Jackson would be born significantly decreased, too. We rested knowing that while we hadn’t intended for a C section, it wasn’t the end of the world. But it clearly a little test of our dependency on God as our Father.
As a dad I like to be in control. Our kids are old enough where I’ve learned how to keep things in my family within parameters of my control. Those boundaries are often wide for plenty of room to be brave yet stringent enough to keep everyone out of harms way. Control is a necessary function of parenting. In many ways it isn’t that I like to be in control. It’s that my role as a father means I need to be in control.
Yet, in this situation we were removed from the control position. We knew nothing about having a baby this way. We were going to have to completely give up control to people we barely knew and trust that they would take care of us in our most vulnerable state.
On one side of the teeter totter was the birth process we knew. Being a known process, even if it ended in more frustration, seemed good to us because we knew it. On the other side of the teeter totter was the birth process we knew of, knew a lot of facts about, but couldn’t trust from our experience.
Back and forth we went.
All afternoon, we teeter-tottered between rationally knowing that the surgery was the only way to go and the fear of the unknown. And yet God’s peace began to fill the room with each passing hour.
Finally, the hour arrived. With all of the preparations complete an OR nurse came into our room and started to pull Kristen’s bed out of the room.
We were helpless with what was about to happen. We had zero control. We signed consent forms. Our “yes” was in writing! This wasn’t some sort of metaphysical letting go anymore… literally, Kristen’s life and Jackson’s life were being wheeled down the hallway.
Kristen went down the hall into the operating room and I was left alone behind the big double doors. Alone in the moment. I was trying to think about anything but “what if?”
My mind swirled in those moments. Thinking about seeing Jackson in a few minutes. Thinking about the order of who to call after he was born. Thinking about news of an earthquake in Christchurch, NZ. Thinking about the deliveries of Megan and Paul. Thinking about if I had watered the plant above my desk at home. Thinking about all the episodes of TV hospital drama I’d seen and never actually been into an operating room. Thinking about how I was going to juggle taking pictures with both my iPhone and my still camera. Thinking about what I wanted to say to Kristen when he was born.
Round and round my brain went. 1,000 miles per hour and 1,000 directions at once. My world felt very small in those few moments. My whole world was limited to the two 12×12 tiles my feet were frozen in.
There was never a place in my life so alone as in that hallway. And for Kristen, I’m sure there was never a more alone place than laying on that table getting prepped. If marriage is about oneness than we shared in the oneness of our aloneness in that moment.
Finally, the door opened and a nurse moved me to another room. A real waiting area. More like a closet. I’d be brought into the operating room just before they were ready to pull him out. Fortunately, there was a chair there so I could sit down. I collapsed into the seat– still swirling and full of emotion. There wasn’t anything I could do. Just sit.
As the nurse closed the door leaving me alone I felt God’s presence arrive and fill the room. It’s hard to explain. But I just started to feel the same phrases over and over again. Not audible, not in mind mind… but somewhere in between. “You are mine. Jackson is mine. I’m in charge.”
I don’t know how long I was in there. Probably just a couple of minutes. But it was glorious! Now, all of a sudden, it felt like the whole experience was holy ground.
The nurse came back to get me. I put on my surgical mask. And the next few minutes were a blur of seeing Kristen, hearing the doctors talk, and culminating with the phrase, “Time. Seventeen-eleven.” I leaned to my left and there he was… Jackson Tucker McLane.
The bottom line is simple: When God shows up– Everything changes.
My life was turned upside down multiple times in the past 12 months. All of which I’m entirely grateful for.
Haiti – On January 12th, as news flooded in that much of Port-au-Prince had crumbled in an earthquake, I prayed a crazy prayer. I asked God to comfort those who were dying, bring emergency help if possible for those who survived, and if He wanted I was willing to go.
Little did I know that 5 weeks later I’d be standing amidst the rubble. We helped where we could. We prayed with people and met plenty of pastors looking for aid. But the thing that rattled me more than anything was to feel a nation suddenly turn their heart towards God. An emotion leapt out of every person that sang in the streets, “I’m alive, so I can celebrate! I’m alive because of Jesus! I will celebrate even though I have nothing!” The only way I can describe that is that it felt like I’d been given the opportunity to dip my toe in a river of God’s benevolence. It’s was more powerful than anything I’d ever experienced.
My perspective was changed when people who slept in tents on the rocky bare ground asked if they could pray for me. That re-defined what it means to be poor.
Baby – One Sunday in late June the game was changed. “I’m pregnant.” Two words that I’ve wanted to hear for a long time but never really thought I’d hear again. Over the next few months we’ve had to wrap our minds around what it’ll mean to have a baby in the house again. Unlike with our first baby the question we’ve been asking ourselves is, “How little stuff do we think we can get away with acquiring?” There are, of course, bigger questions to be answered. How will this baby change our family? How will we handle child care? Will this baby finally have curly hair like Kristen?
My perspective was changed when the reality set in that this is an opportunity to apply what we learned with Megan and Paul. In many ways we’re brand new parents.
Openness – For some reason I’d kept a muzzle on myself. I suppose I had a fear that if I really opened up and said what was on my mind– instead of what I thought people wanted me to say– that people would like me less. And I certainly felt the sphincter effect on my creativity as more and more people began reading my blog after Marko left YS.
Then, late last year I woke up and realized something. “I just don’t care. I need to be 100% me 100% of the time. This is who God made me and I need to be gaudy in that. Let the chips fall where they may.” It’s been interesting to see the results in 2010. I’ve written things in 2010 that I literally done with fear and trembling… and time and again those things have been affirmed as not just OK… but words that people needed to read. More good things have happened as a result of trying to be true to myself than I ever would have thought possible.
My perspective was changed when I internalized that the world has enough pretenders. Sometimes you need to do things that are counter-intuitive to break through a barrier.
All of this has given me new ears to listen. New levels of obedience. And an overwhelming excitement for days to come.
Hi! I'm Rex. I'll be running your life the next 25 years. Cool?
This is Rex. He’s the king of kings and the lord of lords for most families.
Like all babies the moment he popped out changed his parents lives forever.
Born shortly before his physical birth are the high expectations for Rex. Not unlike generations past, Rex’s parents have ideals. They’d like to see him grow up to be a lawyer and maybe play some college football. Either way, Rex will get into a prestigious university with a full ride.
Before Rex was born, Rex’s mom (as her license plate proudly declares) was a manager at a health insurance company. But her family is her top priority so now she’s a stay-at-home mom. Her new job is to pour everything into baby Rex. And right from the moment Rex’s mom found out she was pregnant she has done everything right. She has moved from the manager of 15 employees to the manager of Rex’s life.
We all know this story. We all see it every day.
Parents who think their kid is special. Parents who push their kids into activities and “learning opportunities.” Parents whose lives completely revolve around providing the perfect incubator for their kids.
It’s an ivory tower. By the time most of us in youth ministry see Rex, he’s either living up to the expectations, faking it, or the ivory tower has collapsed.
All hell breaks loose when Rex, at 13, already hates football and just doesn’t have the aptitude to be a lawyer. He likes to work on engines. And that’s not going to cut it for parents who want him to go to law school and be the star wide receiver.
The first two years of high school will be painful until his parents finally relent and allow Rex to be who he wants him to be. Begrudgingly.
Reality
Middle-class American ideals have built an ivory tower which simply cannot bear the weight of the cultural expectations for middle-class children.
There are simply too many gods. Everyone cannot be special. Everyone cannot become a millionaire. Everyone cannot earn an athletic or academic scholarship.
But sit in any stands for any level of athletic competition and eavesdrop on parents talking about their kids. All parents have bought the lie that their kid is special.
They aren’t. Most kids are average. That’s why we call it average.
Ignoring Reality
And yet parents set themselves on a failure-bound path and build their identity through the accomplishments of their children.
The Contrast
For Kristen and I, it took leaving middle-class white suburban America and moving into a melting pot city to have our eyes opened to this.
In Romeo, when we attended parent meetings, we were considered young. Really young. Most of the parents of elementary school children were in their late-30s to mid-50s. They drove massive SUVs, lived in big homes, went skiing in Vail and vacationed in Florida, proudly chased their children around from activity to activity, and couldn’t understand why we looked at them weird when they quoted Bon Jovi lyrics or referenced movies from before we were born.
Kristen and I had Megan when we were 24 years old. Having chosen of life of poverty– I mean working at a church— we had what we needed and splurged on some things every once in a while. At school and church we were constantly reminded that we were too young to be parents. Parents of our contemporaries said to us all the time, “You married so young! My daughter just isn’t ready. It must have been so hard.”
Living at home with an over-bearing mom sounds more stressful than getting married at 21. At least to me.
We lived in a nice house, drove a nice car, and had to budget which activities we could afford to put Megan and Paul in. But we made roughly half what other parents in the school made and were passively reminded of it all the time.
Rex, the Golden Calf
Many families in Romeo worshipped their children. It was a little scary. Little Rex went from school, [where mom volunteered 3 times per week) to a math tutor, [He was only in the percentile on math] to soccer practice, [dad’s the travel coach, so lets work on skills] to the house, [gotta do some homework and grab a quick dinner] to hockey practice. [ice time always has kids up late] It wasn’t unusual to see parents do this routine with each child, 4-5 days per week.
Parents were exhausted. Kids were exhausted. Yet no one questioned if all of this craziness really worked.
Kids love it, right?
And the kids were far worse off for it. No time to dream. No imagination allowed. No unorganized play. No time without adult supervision. Even in high school. On and on. Kids were tired and programed to death. And while these children marched through high school achieving a resume-building life, they couldn’t get into great colleges because they lacked the one thing it seemed the big schools valued more than a resume– independence.
Parents were far worse off for it, as well. It put way too much pressure on the marriage to race the kids around all over the place and blow countless thousands of dollar on travel hockey and travel soccer. We’d tell parents about our date nights while watching the kids play soccer and hear things like, “Oh my gosh, you guys go on dates every week? Tom and I haven’t had a date in years.” No wonder Rex was an only child! They spent $20,000 a year on activities but couldn’t afford $50 for a sitter and a date.
What’s up with that?
Rex was the center of their universe.
Simply put, there was no way Rex would live up to their expectations.
By the time they reached our high school group it was clear to see which Rex’s were still garnishing the parents worship and which had been cast off. When little Rex failed to live up to the expectations, Rex was likely to get put on a maintenance budget and largely ignored. (Hence, Romeo is known as a drug town.)
Here in San Diego we feel old when we go to the kids school! When we go to school activities we are clearly a few years older than the majority of parents. (There are a few parents our age.) And the earning power of the working poor is much different than the earning power of suburban middle class. Sure, kids are in activities, but they aren’t worshipped with the same ferocity. Typical kids in our school have a a parent who takes them to school, a grandparent who picks them up and watches them in the afternoon, and sees mom or dad when they get home late in the evening.
There are no Rex’s in our kids school.
The American dream for parents at Darnall in San Diego looks a lot different than the dream at Amanda Moore in Romeo. One dream is achievable/realistic while the other is a statistical impossibility.
This is the lie: A child, put in the “perfect environment,” will succeed at a higher rate than his peers in less-than-perfect environments.
This is the truth: Healthy, happy, well-adjusted children home will increase the likelihood of a happy, healthy, well-adjusted home.
This is the lie: You can incubate a high-achieving child.
This is the truth: Two of the last three Presidents of the United States came from pretty rough family backgrounds. Intrinsic work ethic overcame all other disadvantages.
This is the lie: High activity, camps, travel teams increase your child’s potential of an athletic scholarship.
This is the truth: Few college or professional prospects come out of those camps or travel squads in football, basketball, or baseball. Next level coaches are looking for qualities you can’t control like height, speed, instinct.
This is the lie: A 4.0 in high school will guarantee entrance to a prestigious university.
This is the truth: A well-rounded student will both get into good universities and graduate from good universities.
Hi, I'm Rex. I'll be the king of your life if you let me.
If you are a parent or if you work with parents you are well aware that there’s a lot of idolatry of children going on. In this four-part series I plan on exploring this phenomenon, it’s origins, and its impact on our society and the American family.
How did we get here?
People are waiting longer, much longer, to have their first child. The average age of marriage for a woman has crept past 25. (27+ for males) And it’s not uncommon for people to wait until their mid-30s to begin having children. And when those parents finally pop out a kid– a coronation takes place as the child is crowned king of the parents universe.
It is logical that an older set of parents has had longer to dream about being a parent, more impact of cultural ideals, [movies, television, books, magazines] and more mature in the workforce to have higher wages, more time off, and more flexibility.
Old parents
This is a purely cultural phenomenon. The only reason men and women don’t have children in their late-teen to early-20s is because our society requires it. It’s taboo to marry or have kids young now. (Trust me, I’ve got plenty of friends who married in their early 20s and had kids under 25… they bear the wrath of middle-class culture scorn!)
Biologically, this causes problems. Like it or not, the human body is “ready” in the mid-teen years. In human history this is when women started having children. Interestingly, cultural influence have caused females to enter puberty earlier and earlier. But it’s become increasingly taboo to have sex or conceive children in the teen years. Sexual activity is normative for minors yet culturally we frown on teen moms. Biologically speaking– the body is strongest, the reproductive system is the most ready, on and on. There’s no biological reason for waiting to have a first child until late-20s or the early 30s. In fact, human history is built on young mothers of 14-22. Common sense tells us that when you tell your body “no” to reproduction for 15 years or more, your body just might not want to say “yes” when you are culturally ready. Thus, we’ve seen an increase in physical problems with older mothers.
Culturally, this also causes problems. Middle-class American culture tells a woman she needs to go to college and start a career before “settling down” to be a parent. So men and women marry later and acquire more stuff before marriage. (and debt) By their mid-30s, affluence leads them into the baby worship we see today. The American Dream coaxes parents to believe that each generation has to be exponentially more affluent and educated than the previous generation. The problem is that macro-economics doesn’t work that way. Middle-class parents simply can’t raise children to become more wealthy than they are… there is a statistical glass ceiling to what the economy can bear. Economically speaking, we blame Wall Street for the recent collapse of the housing market when, in fact, the Middle-class bought the American Dream on credit. (Interesting article from Time Magazine, “Older Parents: Good for Kids?“ Written in 1988)
We scornfully look down on young parents. We track the teen pregnancy rate in pitiful, arrogant, ignorance of the fact that in most places on the planet a 16-17 year old mother is normative– and our own grandparents would now be scorned in today’s late-marriage status quo. We’ve put so much pressure on ourselves that our kids will have it better than ourselves that from the time children are in the womb we want to educate them and put them ahead of their peer group. Our culture has created this truism. Young mothers are bad or naughty, older mothers are more prepared and nurturing. But is there evidence that this is true? Doubtful.
The Allure of the American Dream
In my opinion, the root of the baby-god-myth was born in the pursuit of the American dream among Middle-class parents. If little Rex is going to be better than well-off mommy and daddy, we’re going to have to push and shape harder than our parents did.
Sadly, the church joins in
This is a chicken/egg phenomenon as each side would argue the other started it. But any church growth expert knows that if you want to attract parents these days you need an amazing kids program. The hope is that if you can attract Rex and keep him happy, a parent will get hooked into participating in the greater church. This is, indeed, born out of an earnest desire to attract and reach lost people. But the churches desire to reach out to the little Rex’s of the community in hopes of hooking parents has lead to attracting parents and staff who buy into a format of church that idealizes the American dream. A thriving kids program is polished, safe, fun, and good for Rex. It’s bigger and better every year. Even if it isn’t, we strive for that in all we do.
And today’s kids ministry ideals are largely devoid of Deuteronomy 6:4-9
Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.
The church often gives lip service to this truth. But systematically, we are quick to bail on parental responsibility and claim it as our own since Rex’s parents are too busy shuttling him to soccer practice and it’d be too embarrassing to tie anything scripturual as symbols on their hands. Sadly, church is often merely seen as “the holistic part” of Rex’s college resume to parents who are involved “because it’s good for the kids.” And little Rex picks up on this, in full knowledge that his parents gods are him and the stuff they are acquiring. We wonder why kids check out of church? Maybe it’s just the way we’ve raised them?
It would be controversial for the church to stand up to parents and tell them the truth. “You are worshipping your children. You are to put God first, your marriage second, and your children third. Children are subservient to their parents!” No– this is heresy in our culture. We all know, intrinsically, that if we were to proclaim that kind of truth the parents and their money which pays for our nice building and staffs would quickly disappear.
Alas, the church is often sad peddler of the baby-god-myth.
METRO ATLANTA, Ga. — Last weekend an Atlanta pastor made a promise that stunned his congregation and most of the people who heard it.
In a speech that discussed abortion, the President, and the sanctity of life, the most provocative statement from Pastor Vic Pentz of Peachtree Presbyterian Church came towards sermon’s end:
“I make a promise to you now and I don’t want you to keep this a secret,” the pastor pronounced, “the Peachtree Presbyterian Church will care for any newborn baby you bring to this church.
“We will be the family to find a home for that child, and there’s no limit on this. You can tell your friends, you can tell your family, you can tell the whole world …”
Reflected Pentz a week later, “I seem to have touched a nerve by saying that to the congregation.”
Honestly, this is what the church has always done. This is what the church in many parts of the world does today. Wouldn’t it be amazing if your church issued the same challenge?
