Sunday morning the pastor took a quick poll in morning worship: “How many of you had a leisurely, relaxing morning, and everything went smoothly on the way here?”
That was quickly followed by: “How many of you have had a stressful morn so far?”
I swiftly raised my hand to the second of those 2 Q’s (… love the freedom and grace to be authentic on Sunday mornings…). My morning stunk. My youngest son had a major meltdown.
When I refer to a major meltdown, I mean major. It was ugly and loud and nothing I’d want noticed when focused too much on Impression Management 101. It didn’t make either my son nor me look good. He was a mess. So was I.
Not only was Josh a mess, but he was disobedient and disrespectful. He was tired and cranky and such evolved into obstinacy and arrogance. Like I said, it was ugly.
Every now and then, I find one of those rare moments of parenting when everything within me seems to converge, and I humbly realize this is a huge teaching moment. My sense is that such probably occurs a whole lot more often than I realize; but far too frequently I am too impatient, too busy, or too self-focused to recognize the meaning of the moment. I am too distracted by daily life to teach the lessons that will serve my kids for all their life.
Not last Sunday morning.
As my son’s temper turned to tears and his disrespect morphed not-so-calmly into regret, I simply sat beside him — silently but not ostensibly nor overtly compassionate. Truth be told, my heart welled will enormous compassion — recognizing the potential teaching of the time.
Josh’s body, which previously shook in accordance with all tears, was calm now. The tears, though, continued to quietly, abundantly flow. After a few more pregnant pauses, Josh drudgingly but deliberately raised his eyes to meet mine. “I’m sorry.” The sincere admission prompted even more tears, but now he was listening. Now he could hear me. Now was the time my words were most important, carrying the most significant of weight.
“Josh, you have to choose to be obedient no matter how you feel. You still have to choose what’s right.”
Therein lay my ‘a-ha’ for the week; my words to this precious, teachable young man were words so much of the rest of the world has so obviously, so quickly, and so seemingly, callously discounted. We aren’t even always so young. And certainly, we are not always nor even consistently teachable. Of course, the Intramuralist often wonders as to why. I suppose we’re too often too impatient, busy, or self-focused; we’re distracted by daily life. Arguably instead, we are distracted by emotion. Our emotion tends to trump what is right.
Instead of choosing what’s right no matter how we feel, my strong sense is that the rest of the watching world is more likely to actually change what they previously perceived as right. Instead of consistently doing the right thing, we allow our emotions to justify what we once knew to be wrong; we allow our emotions to actually change what the right thing is…
“Because I feel this way, it must be right…”
Perhaps we’re too emboldened by our self-serving practice of Impression Management; perhaps we are so emboldened that we don’t actually articulate the practice aloud, although the bottom line point remains the same…
We aren’t always as teachable as my precious, young Joshua.
True, Josh has much to learn. So do we. Hopefully, none of us will continue to be so distracted.
Respectfully,
AR