I deleted more emails this morning. As a Non-profit leader, my inbox fills with offers to help ‘increase end-of-year giving.’ I generally believe good and helpful organizations send these. But, several years ago, I believe I heard God calling me to a different path…I was to serve Him, my family, Renovation Community, and this community (especially the poorest) as faithfully as I knew how. And I was to share where I witness God working. That was all. No fundraising, grant-writing, or donor appeals. God might call others to such work, but that would not be my calling. Often, it seems God has called me to a ministry of “Little Things.” I spent hours today trimming bushes and then hanging Christmas lights. Our Parsonage is the only single-family house on the street, occupied by the only white family on the street. A “renter’s mentality” can easily set in on such a street. Why take care of a place your landlord doesn’t take care of? Why hang Christmas lights if you won’t be here long?
Lights on the Parsonage become an opportunity to minister in “little things.” I wave to every passing car. I talk with the neighbor across the street and two kids who pass on bicycles. I smile at the same familiar faces I’ve invited many times to worship services. How must I look to my neighbors as I smile and wave? A little strange? Nerdy? I think of Dr. King’s “Dream” and carry on. I’m ministering through little waves and smiles…striving for a different reality on my own street. I may be strange and nerdy, but at least they’ll know I’m kind and know I would gladly worship in the same room as them. I’ll never win Church Growth awards with my strategies. But I keep smiling, waving, inviting, and showing neighbors I love my street. One of my homeless friends passes. We chat about 15 minutes before he continues on his way. I invite him, again, too.
December comes tomorrow. My inbox calls me to ‘maximize year-end giving.’ “Church X increased its December donations by X% with our proven strategies!” But Jesus calls me to maximize my time listening to Him. On my knees at our bushes, Corrie Ten Boom’s The Hiding Place audiobook plays in my ears. God miraculously kept a contraband Liquid Vitamin bottle flowing with life-saving drops in a Nazi concentration camp as Corrie and her sister shared God’s love with hurting people. He can handle December, and our finances, much better than me.
Two surprise checks arrived in the mail today from dear family friends. $500 for my family. $1200 for our church.
[The first words from the 1st grader I tutored this morning] Me: “Hi bud! How was your weekend?” Him: “My dad screamed at [dad’s girlfriend]. He was defending me after she screamed at me.”
We quickly moved on with our lesson on digraphs. I had him mimic me… “Watch how my lips open and my tongue touches my teeth for the TH sound. Thuh Thuh Thuh Thuh. You do it. Touch your tongue to your teeth….”
After our second session, I wrote how tears streamed down his face for thirty minutes as he talked about his Daddy’s girlfriend, who screams at him when he visits on the weekends.
Today, our third session, his first words recount being screamed at and then watching adults scream at each other.
He’s a male ethnic minority, reading far-behind is peers, growing up in poor, divided homes, with unmarried parents. Because at least one of his parents is in an unmarried-but-cohabiting relationship, this little boy interacts with his father’s live-in girlfriend (who “follows my daddy wherever he goes”) in a stressful scream-filled relationship. He regularly hears adults scream at him and with one another. Consciously or unconsciously, he is already learning ‘adults communicate by screaming.’ Given these two adults’ tenuous relationship, my little buddy may eventually adjust to a new “normal,” if Daddy’s girlfriend and her kids leave. But, then again, a new girlfriend might move in and the Adjustment Cycle will resume.
A pattern in the prisons
I cannot, and would not, venture to predict this little boy’s future. But the general future of boys like him with similar backgrounds is well-documented and, sadly, quite predictable.
Our prisons are filled with men who had strikingly similar stories as children: ethnic-minority males, poor upbringing, broken and/or divided homes, parents’ significant others cycling in/out of their lives, and low literacy levels. With each new grade level, their school work will worsen and their frustration will increase. The longer they observe their closest adult family members living out unhealthy patterns, the more they will follow those patterns in their own interactions. The more adults cycle in and out of their lives, the more they will treat relationships with detachment and objectification. Their family’s financial poverty will limit their opportunities and, often, sense of hope. And, they will suffer racist wounds my white children will never know.
As these little boys grow, they will be held more responsible for their own actions (as they should be). Some will eventually stand in courts before a judge, who will hold them accountable for their crimes. When they get out, some will call pastors like me from their Halfway Houses or ring pastor’s doorbells asking to use the showers in the church building (both of which happened to me last week). Society will then discuss their many “poor choices” leading to their imprisonment and present adult difficulties. There will be much truth in these discussions about their “choices.” And yet, as with so many issues of the human heart and ‘free will,’ the full story is more complex.
Learning like a parrot
The neurology of Learning is quite clear: much of our learning, especially during our youngest and most-formative years, happens through Mimicry.
As little children, we ‘parrot’ adults’ words, accent, voice inflection, walking patterns, communication styles, food preferences, favorite sports team, the list goes on. As we age, the number of people we ‘parrot’ grows to include peers and others we admire. The Mimicry changes and becomes more nuanced, but it never stops. Un-learning years of mimicked dysfunction can feel as difficult for some people as un-learning the accent they grew up speaking.
But my little Reading Buddy, and countless like him, aren’t doomed to become a Statistic. He just needs more people investing in him, tutoring him, listening to him.
In other words, he needs more adults to mimic… ‘Watch how I interact in this stressful situation…see how I didn’t scream?…notice how I treat my wife and my children…see how I spoke to that person? Can you use a respectful tone the way I just did? Notice how I use my free time?…’
“we must help the weak”
My little friend is weak educationally, relationally, and emotionally. With the tiniest bit of sacrifice on my part (just 30 minutes each week), I’m trying to help in the little ways I can. Hopefully, I can help him in more ways later on. I’ll invite him to Renovation Community’s summer day camp and feeding program and I’ll ask his school counselor if there are other ways our church and I could help his family.
You can help children like my little buddy, too. If you’re near me, ask me how you can help at the elementary school where I serve. Or, just call up your closest public school and offer to volunteer in whatever way they need.
Give your time to those who desperately need it.
“In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ ” Acts 20:35
[Excerpts from my 30-minute reading tutoring session with a 1st grader this morning.] Him: *tears streaming down face and pooling on table below* “I miss my daddy.” Me: “Did you stay at your daddy’s house this weekend?” Him: “Uhh huh.” Me: “Do you like staying at your Daddy’s?” Him: “Yeah” Me: “What’s your daddy do for work?” Him: “He doesn’t have a job. But he used build buildings and make sidewalks.” Me: “Does your Daddy live with anyone else?” Him: “He lives with [woman’s name].” Me: “Why does he live with her? Is that his wife?” Him: “Because my daddy says she keeps following him.” Me: “Do you like her?” Him: “No. She’s mean. She screams at me.” Me: “Great job today. Let’s go back to class.” Him: *slowly walks down the hall with tears still on his cheeks*
The world is filled with hurting people from broken homes and broken lives. They’re desperate for someone willing to invest in them and help them process their pain. Though I didn’t plan to, I did that today in bite-sized chunks throughout 30 minutes. You can do it, too. It just takes time and a listening ear.
“He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.” Psalm 147:3
“You are SO smart! Has anyone ever told you how smart you are?!”
Those words caused tears to well up in a little boy’s eyes. I moved on quickly so he wouldn’t start crying there in the school library. I just finished my first reading tutoring with him. He’s in the same grade as our 6-year-old but struggles to read words our son mastered 2 years ago.
As we continued our 30-minute-session, I changed tactics to prevent his tears from flowing…such overt compliments were too much for his little heart to handle. I had him compliment himself— Me: “Good. Say ‘I am smart.’” Him: “I am smart.”
“Therefore encourage one another and build each other up…” 1 Thessalonians 5:11
