99 Balloons
99 Balloons from Igniter Media on Vimeo.
Eliot was born with an undeveloped lung, a heart with a hole in it and DNA that placed faulty information into each and every cell of his body. However, that could not stop the living God from proclaiming Himself through this boy who never uttered a word.
In the midst of heartbreaking tragedy, the Mooney family found the presence of God strengthening, comforting, and guiding them. Their story reminds us to seek God and endure our struggles rather than blame Him for our hardships.
HT: JT
Five Dangerous Things You Should Let Your Children Do
Watch Gever Tulley’s 2007 TED Talk: Five Dangerous Things You Should Let Your Children Do.
I’ve haven’t read it yet, but I will soon read Tulley’s new book, Fifty Dangerous Things (You Should Let Your Children Do). Fathers, join me.
Learn more about Tulley’s Tinkering School.
A Conversation at the Park
A guest post from Taylor Buzzard:
I present you with another one of those once-in-a-blue-moon, sporadic posts from me, Justin’s wife!
Today I was at one of the parks in our city. I struck up a conversation with another mother while our young sons played on the slide. She shared with me that she is a school teacher, and that being separated from her son caused her to cry every morning for the first six months of the school year. Now it is summertime, and she is overjoyed to spend every day with her 12 month-old.
She looked at me and said with a bit of longing in her voice, “Do you get to stay home?” I replied, “Yes, I get to stay home with my boys, I’m very grateful. But, well, you know, actually, it’s probably more accurate to say, I choose to stay home. My family lives in a small 2 bedroom condo without a yard. So the trade-off is obvious. But I wouldn’t change my situation for anything.”
I seem to get into this type of conversation semi-regularly. Whether it is someone saying, “We both have to work, there isn’t an option,” or, “I’m so jealous that you get to stay home,” I do my best to gently and humbly correct them. Yes, I am privileged to stay home to raise my children. And, yes, you probably have an option.
In most instances, two full-time incomes are not mandatory. What it primarily comes down to is lifestyle. In America, we are bred to live beyond our means. We are almost brainwashed to believe that children must be raised in a large home, with an expansive yard, with 2 luxury vehicles, with the gamut of extracurricular activities available to them, with a private university tuition covered; and if we don’t provide the aforementioned amenities, we are depriving our children.
But, wait, is it really deprivation not to provide these things to my children? If I re-entered the workforce full-time, we would be better positioned to provide the American-dream upbringing for our children. But, what would the cost be? Everything has a cost, as one of my pastors, Mark Mitchell, recently taught the twentysomethings of our church. The cost to my young children would be spending the majority of their time without either parent in their most formative, impressionable years. I physically carried these children in my womb, and I want to carry them, literally and figuratively, through their childhood years as well.
I am aware that this article taps into a controversial topic, and I understand and respect the fact that in some instances there truly is not an option to be home with your children. But, we must remember that in most cases, it truly is a choice that we are making. And might we make that choice with full understanding of the cost at hand.
3 Paragraphs for New Fathers
For my fellow new-ish fathers out there, these three paragraphs are must reading. They articulate and name the deep transitions that come with becoming a dad. As I near three years of being a dad, these paragraphs nail it for me. From Andrew Peach, via Justin Taylor:
Most fathers-to-be suppose that their old ego-centered lives will continue more or less unabated after the child arrives. With the exception of a few more obstacles and demands on their time, their involvement with their children is envisioned as being something manageable and marginal. Nothing like a complete transformation—an abrupt end to their former life—really enters men’s minds.
But then the onslaught begins, and a man begins to realize that these people, his wife and children, are literally and perhaps even intentionally killing his old self. All around him everything is changing, without any signs of ever reverting back to the way they used to be. Into the indefinite future, nearly every hour of his days threatens to be filled with activities that, as a single-person or even a childless husband, he never would have chosen. Due to the continual interruptions of sleep, he is always mildly fatigued; due to long-term financial concerns, he is cautious in spending, forsaking old consumer habits and personal indulgences; he finds his wife equally exhausted and preoccupied with the children; connections with former friends start to slip away; traveling with his children is like traveling third class in Bulgaria, to quote H.L. Mencken; and the changes go on and on. In short, he discovers, in a terrifying realization, what Dostoevsky proclaimed long ago: “[A]ctive love is a harsh and fearful reality compared with love in dreams.” Fatherhood is just not what he bargained for.
Yet, through the exhaustion, financial stress, screaming, and general chaos, there enters in at times, mysteriously and unexpectedly, deep contentment and gratitude. It is not the pleasure or amusement of high school or college but rather the honor and nobility of sacrifice and commitment, like that felt by a soldier. What happens to his children now happens to him; his life, though awhirl with the trivial concerns of children, is more serious than it ever was before. Everything he does, from bringing home a paycheck to painting a bedroom, has a new end and, hence, a greater significance. The joys and sorrows of his children are now his joys and sorrows; the stakes of his life have risen. And if he is faithful to his calling, he might come to find that, against nearly all prior expectations, he never wants to return to the way things used to be.
Fathers & Replacement Glory
“A man will forget that, as a father, he has been welcomed to the transcendent glory of being part of God’s work of forming human souls. Instead he will buy into the replacement glory of career success. More and more, his life will be eaten up and defined by his work. Less and less will his sense of purpose have to do with the formative community that only he can offer his children. Sadly, his children cease to be one of the joyful focuses of his living and become an obligation in an already-too-busy schedule. Less and less do his children know him, respect him, trust him, or feel his love.”
-Paul David Tripp, A Quest For More: Living for something bigger than you, p. 29
Forming Family Traditions: Sunrise Easter Service
Now that we’re a young family of four, Taylor and I have been thinking a lot about family traditions. It’s been fun to discuss the question: What traditions do we want to have shape and set rhythm for our growing family?
This Easter, at Taylor’s initiative, we took our first stab at doing what we hope will become an annual family tradition: a sunrise Easter service. For those of you who don’t have this tradition going and might be interested in getting it going, here’s what we did:
-Chose a hilltop down the street from our home where we knew we’d catch a good sunrise
-Invited neighbors to join us
-Woke the boys up at 5:50am, met up with friends, and hiked about a mile to the hilltop with breakfast in tow
-Gathered together and, as the sun began to rise, we read the resurrection story and then prayed and sang a song together
-Ate breakfast and drank coffee
-Let the kids enjoy an Easter egg hunt
-Took some photos
-Raced off to CPC to prep for our morning services while wife, kids, and other lingered
I think this tradition will be a keeper.
Taylor has been enjoying reading Kent and Barbara Hughes’ book, Disciplines of a Godly Family, as it’s been stimulating her thinking on traditions. You might want to check it out.
Most Impressionable Years
“Give me the children until they are seven and anyone may have them afterwards.”
St. Francis Xavier
Algebra for Parenting
Photo: Cru & Hudson Buzzard
A guest post by Taylor Buzzard:
This is a mathematics post. The reason for this different approach is my teething four-month-old’s frequent nighttime waking, which leaves me struggling to think clearly enough to form sentences. Math doesn’t require too many sentences, so I think this is a good plan. Let’s get started.
Your children are your dependents for 18 years. Yes, in some cases children try to remain dependents indefinitely. But, our task is to prepare them for life on their own, and 18 years is the amount of time they are our legal dependents, so 18 is the number we will work with.
Our algebra equation for the day is as follows:
x / 18 = y
“x” is your child’s age.
18 is the number of years your child is your dependent.
“y” is the percentage of time that has passed.
My firstborn is a mere 2.25 years old. He’s so young that I catch myself calling him my baby from time to time. Yet, mathematics tells me a sad truth.
2.25 /18 = 0.125
0.125 = 12.5%
12.5% of my time with him as my dependent is GONE. DONE. OVER. When I first did this calculation, I thought I had set up the equation wrong. It couldn’t be true, there had to be a mistake somewhere. I redid the math, I checked the equation, and had to face the dark reality. Over 10% of my time is done. And he’s still in diapers!
Algebra can help with parenting.
If you’ve had a challenging day with a know-it-all teenager, a pre-pubescent tween, a non-stop question asking child, or a shrieking infant, do the math and watch your heart soften. Our time with our children is fleeting. Be intentional. Seize every moment by the horns. And do the math again, every now and then, to remind yourself of how fast their childhood is going to whiz by.
Please, do the math. The math will help you love your children better today. The math will make you take a giant step backwards, away from the difficulties of parenting, to better see the privilege and delight of parenting. Take your child’s age, divide it by 18. Take the resulting number and move the decimal point over 2 places to the right, and that is the percentage of time that has passed. Leave a comment if the result leaves you a bit shocked.
Phone vs. Email
A guest post by Taylor Buzzard:
I have a trivia question for you.
What surprisingly requires all of the following, simultaneously:
Left hand.
Right hand.
Left eye.
Right eye.
Brain.
Physical body orientation.
?
EMAIL. Email requires all of the above, all at the same time. And that is why email has become a thorn in my flesh. Email asks too much of me.
I used to love email. I thought it was fun, a convenient way to plan and touch base with people, a vehicle for being witty and silly with friends, and a way to be creative with writing. But, as of 3 months ago, I now have two young children. And, as of 3 months ago, email demands more than I can give. The inbox piles up higher and higher, and my stress mounts higher and higher. Even as I write about this topic, my heartbeat is accelerating. I just can’t get my email under control.
The phone is much better suited to my lifestyle these days. It allows me to communicate with someone, while still looking at my children, physically interacting with them, and turning my body towards them. Email is like a dark cave that requires me to dive in, whereas the telephone allows me to stay at sea level and multitask. Have you ever noticed that one email topic requires at least 3-4 emails in order to close the issue at hand?
Here’s an example:
Email #1: Do you want to meet up for coffee sometime this week?
Email #2: Sure. I’m free on Tuesday and Wednesday evenings.
Email #3: Oh, bummer, I’m busy those nights. How about Friday morning?
Email #4: Sounds great. Want to meet at Peet’s at 9 am?
Email #5: You’re on. See you there.
Email #6: Alright. See you Friday morning.
I don’t think I exaggerated while writing this out. Six emails for a coffee date. A one-minute phone call could have taken care of all of that.
So, what to do, what to do? I can’t close my email account and call it quits. Email is a component of our modern life, and it would be unwise to pull the plug. I’m looking for ways to live with it without letting it weigh me down. One suggestion I’ve received is to create 3-4 folders where I immediately file every incoming email (To Read, To Answer, Pending, etc.). That way the inbox is always orderly. I’m going to start with this tactic. And if this doesn’t relieve my email stress, I think I will take more serious action and move to the second suggestion I received: to create an auto-reply message that states that I check email on days x, y, and z, and if a response is needed sooner, to please call me.
Email, email, I used to love you so.
Email, email, now I long to let you go.
Email, email, let’s try to make this work.
Email, email, before I go berserk.
Training Your Children to Love God’s Word: 1 Key Practice
As parents, especially as dads, it’s important that we train our children to love God’s Word. Here’s the single greatest way I know how to do this:
Show your children every single week of their lives that YOU love God’s Word.
Chances are high that your children will gain a love and appetite for God’s Word if they grow up observing YOUR consistent and highly visible love, delight, hunger, passion, and desire for knowing and enjoying God through the Scriptures.
Start this practice early. Forge good habits now.
- When your son is one week old, hold him as you read your Bible.
- When your home is wild and noisy with two boys under the age of two, consider not escaping to a hidden corner of the home, but instead having your daily time in the Word somewhere within your kids’ line of sight.
- When your kids are too young to understand what you’re saying, still tell them what you’re discovering/learning, what you’re excited about, from your time in the Word.
Show your children every single week of their lives that YOU love God’s Word.
