Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is

Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widow in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world. - James 1:27-

This morning I went to the abortion clinic for the first time in a while. (Side note: one of many perks of becoming recently unemployed - Saturdays open!) I chose my favorite little sign: Do Not Commit Murder - We Will Adopt YOUR CHILD.

We weren't the only ones with signs today. I noticed, behind the pile of things the three pink-vested volunteer clinic escorts collected at the corner of the building, a handwritten sign. Upside down, it said adoption at the bottom. Why, I wondered, would they have a sign that said that?

After we prayed, grabbed signs, and began walking the sidewalk, one of the escorts held up the sign. She continued to as they talked and laughed, mostly ignoring us. The sign was written clearly in bright colors.

Lucas County Children's Services
has lots of children 
waiting for adoption.

When the woman flipped it over, I saw the other side.

Put your money where your mouth is, it read.

Anger and defenses rose immediately. What do they know? Many in our group have adopted both internationally and in the US as well as become foster parents. Surely our money and our actions are where our mouths are.

But then conviction rose. The sign is right, if not its attitude; we should have our money where our mouth is. I thought of 1 Peter 3:16. "Keep a good conscience so that in the thing in which you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ will be put to shame."

Is this the case? Are we so active that the mouths of those who rise against us are shut?

Praise God for the families who are adopting. But are not many of us resting on their laurels?

I wonder, should every family feel that the burden of adopting is on them unless God clearly shows the otherwise? I remember a statistic I heard: if one family from every THREE churches adopted an eligible child from foster care, and the rest of the families supported that one family, there would be NO CHILDREN in the American foster care system left waiting to be adopted. None. Surely there is at least one family out of every three churches that should adopt!

Not everyone can adopt. But we know that, and how quick we are to make excuses! And how many ways there are to help. Are we giving to families who are adopting? Are we praying? Are we babysitting, bringing meals, or providing emotional support? Are we being especially careful to assist in the training and raising of adopted children?

Are we judging others' methods? As Dwight L. Moody put it so beautifully, I like my way of doing it better than your way of not doing it. With high costs and the issues that always come with adoption, even of babies, it is easy to criticize how families overcome this obstacles to adoption and how many they adopt.

Are we supporting women who decide not to abort their children? Are we supporting ministries that do?

The brassness of the women who volunteer at the clinic is provoking. The women going in almost never respond to the counselors from our group that call out to them. Once, one of the escorts blocked the face of a woman going in from our view with her sign. After escorting one woman in, two of them gave a high-five. It was sad and creepy, highlighting how they deceive the women going in.

We wanted to silence them. I wanted to bring every child that has been adopted in our church and stand them on that corner with a sign, a great big sign. These children were given life in a new home. Your child can be too. Choose adoption.

Parker asked me a few weeks ago, "If someone going in said to me, "If you, you personally, will adopt my child, we won't abort it," should I do it?"

"Of course," I replied. It doesn't matter that we're less than 10 weeks away from the birth of our first child, nor that we're not rich, nor that we live in a small apartment. I wish it would happen, rather than add to the mass of unmarked murders.

Sometimes, though, it's easier to submit in the big things. In a sense, it's easier to decide to adopt a baby and love them as your own than to love the annoying kid your friend adopted, easier to give up thousands of dollars to go to another country to rescue an orphaned child than to give up a few pizza nights to give so someone else can.

Do not give God's enemies occasion to blaspheme. May the church so love the orphans, not in words but in deed, that the mouths of the world are stopped.

Too Many Children

We were assigned to write a political narrative poem for my creative writing class. This isn't so bad as it sounds; categories for poetry are pretty flexible. One of the examples he gave of political narrative was a strange, thought-provoking poem about American consumerist culture, and another a poem I found really amusing about rap music, with very apt descriptions (doesn't "a thousand schizophrenic Shakespeares" describe rap perfectly?).

Still, I wasn't inspired. Then I thought doing one about how we always wanted Mom to have more kids might work for political. However, I had a hard time getting it to be narrative. So I started writing about a baby we wanted to adopt once. I liked the idea and incorporated much that I had written for my first idea.

Too Many Children

We called him Joel.

In our minds, he was perfect and adorable.

He was just the right fit for our family.

“Timmy is getting too old,” we complained to Mom.

“We need another baby.”

“Too old?” she asked. “I’m too old.”

“No,” we said. “People have babies even in their 50’s sometimes.

You should have twins. There’ll be more baby to go around.

It’ll be easy now. We can help.”

“You can’t just order twins,” Mom said.

“Or a baby, for that matter.”

We didn’t care.

At church, we jabbered to our friends,

All at least twice our barely double-digit ages,

About the babies.

“Ruth and Naomi will be their names,” my older sister declared,

Flipping her long brown locks behind her thin shoulders.

“Ruth Arlene and Naomi Annabelle,” she added.

Fifteen months older than I, Deanna was a name enthusiast.

“After our grandmothers,” I informed, grinning.

Our audience would smile at us,

And we were too young to notice the raised eyebrows.

The next week, Mom would be stopped by a hand on her shoulder.

“Congratulations! How many is this?”

The questioner would receive a blank look.

“You’re not pregnant?” they’d ask.

Mom would shake her graying head, smiling.

“Your daughters were talking about twins…”

“They’re just talking. Wistful thinking.”

“Oh,” was the reply.

Every birthday, no one told what they wished for.

There was no need—we knew.

Wait for the singing to end.

“Make a wish!” they’d cry.

Shut your eyes tight.

Whisper under your breath.

I wish Mom would have another baby.

Open your eyes.

Blow, long and steady, until you waver,

Forcing out the last bit of breath.

Sometimes all the flames went out, sometimes not.

Would the wish come true?

Babbling little Timmy couldn’t be called a baby any more,

But there was no sign of another one.

“The older you are,” Mom said,

“the more likely you’ll have complications with the pregnancy.”

“We should adopt,” Deanna suggested.

“Yeah!” we all clamored.

“Our house would never pass inspection,” said Mom.

“That’d be fun,” Dad said. “But adoption is expensive.”

They dismissed it, but late at night when we couldn’t hear, they talked.

I don’t know how we found him,

But we called him Joel,

Our choice from Deanna’s piles of library name books.

We gathered around the armoire,

Looking at his information on the computer screen.

He was going to be a little person when he was born.

We had never seen him, but we loved him.

She wasn’t married, but his mom chose to give him life.      

But not to us.

“Why?” we asked. “Why wouldn’t she let us have him?”

“We have too many kids,” Dad said.

“She thought he wouldn’t get enough attention.”

“Enough attention!” we laughed.

With six older siblings, what child would have more?

“That’s not how they think,” Dad explained.

“They think that he won’t have as much time with the parents.”

We did not understand. He would have plenty of attention.

We could help him.

We could reach things for him.

We would love him.

It was not to be. Some other family got him.

A perfect, 2.5 kid family, perhaps.

Or maybe he was an only child,

So that his parents could give him their full attention,

Without half-a-dozen other people to distract them from him.

Without half-a-dozen people to love him,

Or pray for him,

Or be extra hands and legs for his little body,

Or care for him and their parents when they are old.

Our wishes came true, twice more—

Though they weren’t twins,

So we did fight over getting to hold the baby.

We were happy to be blessed with two more siblings,

But sometimes,

We wish there were nine

And think of Joel.

I took some liberties with the story about Joel; I think it was actually after Paul was born when it happened, and of course none of the speech is exact quotation. Other things I also made more specific than I actually knew.

I was interested to hear people's responses when I read it in the workshop. Their remarks weren't entirely unexpected, but I was still somewhat surprised.

They didn't like my use in the second line of "perfect and adorable." They also wanted to know more about the family and what their interactions are like. Someone said it was like a children's book, and another agreed, saying, "Oh, yeah, it's fairy-tale like." A lot of people thought the use of dialogue was unique and worked.

The professor wrote, "It's tough to pull off a poem in 3rd person [I think he means first person plural?] without imposing a definable group voice, but you almost almost almost pull it off." I also found it hilarious when he marked by the part about what we did at birthdays and wrote childhood fertility/baby Ritual!

I originally called it, "The Perfect Family." Most of them didn't like that. One suggested I "reword the title because it is a little contradictory." Of course, I meant it sort of sarcastically, with a double meaning, a satire of what people consider a perfect family. But one guy said bluntly, "I have an aversion to the word perfect."

One girl said that she thought the conclusion was a little judgmental because it's difficult to predict whether Joel received the love he needed. "However, I do not think this was the narrator's intention. Consider revising these lines to help the reader." They are often, especially my professor, concerned about people sounding judgmental.

But the biggest thing, the main question was this: why do they want more kids? Why isn't what they have enough?

"Consider explaining why the family wants another child after six children already." My professor wrote, "big question: why do they want more kids?"

I didn't know how to explain. I didn't understand: why wouldn't you want more kids?

The most interesting and telling critique was from the guy who wrote that he had an aversion to the word perfect. He said:

I philosophically have a difficult time with this poem and it makes it hard for me to read it objectively, but the family in this poem seem to love each other, and you portray it rather eloquently. I think this poem is very well written and in the eyes of the right audience, will be appreciated.

In the eyes of the right audience. I philosophically have a difficult time with this poem.

That was my trouble with many of the critiques I did: philosophically I differed so much with the poem that it was hard to read objectively. (Especially since in my opinion, they ought not to have been read by any audience, nor written to begin with.)

Isn't that fascinating? I found it interesting that he would say that. It's amazing how your worldview affects your thoughts and opinions, even on things you wouldn't think it would (an idea I shall return to if I post my last poem).

It's not simply a Christian worldview, I have come to find out. Even many Christians, and not just marginalized Christians either, do not value children. Let me rephrase that. They value children, because you cannot be a Christian, read and believe Scripture, and not value children. But they do not love and delight in children. I am not saying that everyone should want more than six kids. The older I get, the more I understand why not everyone is wholly positive about having kids, something I didn't when I was younger. But that doesn't mean that you cannot understand that having many children is a joy.

I have discovered that, in this, my family is something of an anomaly. Even many children from big families do not embrace the idea. Perhaps, however, that has to do with the nature of the children they grew up with.

We've heard lots of comments like this:

"You liked having that many brothers and sisters? I can't deal with the ones I have."
"I wish my brother was like yours."
"Your sisters are so nice. My sister would never do that."
"One sister is more than enough for me!"

"You wanted more siblings?" people ask when we excitedly told Mom was pregnant or said something about wishing she'd had twins.

Do we want more? More best friends? More help around the house? More amusement? More babies? More birthday parties (dude, any excuse for more ice cream is good!)? More people to give Christmas presents to? More brothers- and sisters-in-law? More nieces and nephews? More cousins for our kids? Yes!

I've thought lately what it'll be like when most of us move out. Just imagine: the boys can have the big bedroom-they'll have so much space!-and Kristen can have the boys' room and a walk-in closet to herself! That sounds amazing. I would love it. I have never had the experience of having my own room.

But as I thought about it, I thought, no. I do not envy my youngest siblings. I don't want my own room. I would much rather have my siblings than space. As I am fond of saying, siblings are awesome.

I've thought about that as I've talked with my youngest sister. She doesn't like the idea of Deanna getting married because she doesn't want her to leave. When I tried to convince her that it was good, she said pitifully, "But it's been fun having her here, right?" It's sad and adorable that it affects her so much even at such a young age.

"It's been fun having her." That's a pretty good summary.

Not everyone is called to be in a family with lots of kids. But few relationships-perhaps none save my parents-have shaped me more than those with my siblings. I am thankful. I don't think you can have too many.

Okay, that's not true. My sister used to say she wanted to have 50 and adopt 50. That's a little excessive. I like to remember all of my siblings' names at least. Of course, if you named them all after the states and their capitals as she was going to, that might help.

A good ending ought to tie everything all together. It should never be something random that has nothing to do with the essay. However, nothing is coming to mind and I feel like posting this. Perhaps later I will think of a good ending and change this. Until then this will have to do.

On the other hand, since I write for my own enjoyment, I will probably never change this.

Siblings are awesome. Is that an acceptable ending?

Jesus Will Help Me Find My Life

"Out of the mouths of babes and nursing infants He has perfected praise."

                                                                          - Matthew 21:16

Have you ever heard a little kid "sing" a song they make up on the spot, whatever comes to mind? You never know what exactly will come out next. And you can never quite remember it afterwards, and without a precise tune you cannot repeat it, so anyone who wasn't there can't fully understand what they did. If you're lucky, you have a video camera ready.

Today I was working on a blog post, with my little sister jabbering away to Amy in the background. I was amused by their conversation, but I wasn't really listening. Kristen started to sing in that kid style, with randomness in word and tune. She sang about how she loves everything, but not animals that are mean and hurt you. Still, I paid scant attention until when she started a "new song," something caught my ear.

 "Jesus will help me find my life out because He is powerful," she babbled. 

Did she really say that? I wondered. That's pretty profound for a five-year-old, and I'm pretty sure nobody told her something like that. 

Hmm...this might be interesting. I started typing out what she said. I did not catch it all, but this was the gist.

Jesus will help me find my life out because He is powerful
What happened to my life, what happened to my life, what happened to my life

(This sounded like a real song the way it repeated.)
 
Jesus gonna help me find where on earth is my life
Guys, I think you will laugh and I know you will and it's not funny

(She knows people laugh at her and sometimes tells us not to.)
 
And I don't have a life because I lost it when I was singing because someone took it
I'm going to go ask my friends and I'm going to go around and ask everybody until I find it
Where is my life?
I have it now
Jesus gave it back to me
I am happy about my life

(Seriously? Did she really just say that?)
 
Jesus gave it back to me and I am happy
I found my life and those things are funny but it's not funny I lost my life
I losed my life again and it's not funny

(It amuses me how she says losed rather than lost.)

I'm gonna ask everybody again
Then I can get my life back with Jesus
And this is the end and fingernail polish and spray and things
And I found my life back again.

(I love the random stuff she threw in at the end!)

"And that's the end," she sings. She ends by asking Amy, "Are you happy what I found my life again?"

One thing about little kids: they mix the mundane and the sacred all together. She went on to sing about some other random thing and then to pretend to doctor Amy.

It's a lesson we might take, as we older people are often timid to speak of anything spiritual if we don't have a good way of bringing it up, if it's not a natural part of conversation.

"I lost my life and Jesus gave it back to me," she sang.

Yep. Out of the mouth of that child, the answer to everything. "Jesus gave it back to me and I am happy."

At that time Jesus answered and said, “I thank You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and prudent and have revealed them to babes. - Matthew 11:25

Destroying Children's Imaginations

This summer I have begun a number of books, gradually adding another until I have half-a-dozen or more very good books I want to finish but haven't. I didn't mean to do this; I simply happened upon one book after another that caught my interest and inadvertently started reading.

One day this happened with a medium-sized paperback book lying in a stack on the couch. My interest was caught, first because there was a pile of new books, and then by the cover  of this particular one, which looks like a painting of a child sitting on a moonbeam from a book of nursery poems below a picture (with, oddly, an uncoordinating blue background) of a gray gargoyle. The title was equally interesting and ponderous. Uncapitalized, it read: ten ways to destroy the imagination of your child.

Maybe if you've been around me in the past few weeks you've heard me mention it. It's one of my new favorite books, and one I think every parent raising a child in the modern age should read.

I didn't intend to read it, just to see what it was about. Did the author, Anthony Esolen, think that imagination should be discouraged in children? I picked it up, and Mom said she'd gotten it from CC. It was, indeed, a Classical Conversations edition..

The very first page had me, when he started talking about this vandal who destroyed irreplaceable volumes from his library, and "there wasn't much we could do about it, because the vandal in question made more money than we did and had a nicer office. He was our librarian. It's ironic, but true, that one of the qualifications of the modern librarian is a distaste for books. They take up space, and space, the librarians complain, is limited."

I liked it, but when I got to the second page, I laughed and loved it and had to read it aloud.

"Books are bulky and inconvenient-like rocks, and trees, and rivers, and life. It occurs to me that everything that can be said against the inconvenience of books can be said about the inconvenience of children. They too take up space, are of no immediate practical use, are of interest to only a few people, and present all kinds of problems. They too must be warehoused efficiently, and brought with as little resistance as possible into the digital age."

I am so glad my parents collect both and, much as they protest against their inconvenience, can't seem to stop. (Haha...okay, that last part refers to books, not children...although Mom has protested against the idea of having twins and decides that collecting grandchildren would be preferable.)

The introduction is my favorite part of the book; it's full of great quotes. Such as, in saying how children are not resources because resources are valuable because they are good, solid, dependable, and inert, he gives the example: if a resource were to decide to do something other than its expected use, it would be "worse than useless. It would be an Enemy of the People. Granite is a resource. If a block of granite at the top of an arch were to wriggle loose whenever people weren't around to notice, to drop on the head of the governor, we might swear off building with granite for a while. Or we might use it all the more--but that is another matter."

I love it.

So, we must transform children to make them resources. That leads us to this awesome quote:

"But we don't want that!" my reader objects. Yes, dear reader, you do. Children make liars of us all. Almost everything we say about them is a lie. We believe exactly the opposite, and act accordingly.

That is so true...

Suppose you are a lover of books. You will not say, "Ah, books, yes, books are wonderful. Such treasures, books are! Myself, I don't have any, and I don't want any, or maybe just one, but I so love books!" Why, you would have books strewn about your flat. You would delight in their very bindings and the smell of their pages. You would not know what to do without them. You would not say, "Yes, I love books. That is why I have warehoused them in this special room, far away from company, and far from where I do anything of importance. I keep them locked up behind this glass case, and only take them out on special occasions." You would not say, "Books indeed, our greatest resource. They kindle readily, and make excellent bonfires."

If we loved children, we would have a few. If we had them, we would want them as children, and would love the wonder with which they behold the world, and would hope that some of it might open our own eyes a little. We would love their games, and would want to play them once in a while, stirring in ourselves those memories of play that no one regrets, and that are almost the only things an old man can look back on with complete satisfaction. We would want children tagging along after us, or if not, then only because we would understand that they had better things to do.

Now that is simply intolerable. For the first time in human history, most people are doing things that could never interest a child enough to make him want to tag along. That says less about the child than about us. If someone should say to us, "How would you like to spend most of your waking hours, five days a week, for the next four years, shut within four walls," we should go mad, that is if we had an imagination left. It is only by repressing that imagination that many of us can stand our work.

I know you skipped that quote. Now, go back and read it. It's long, but it's worth it.

Esolen's argument is that in order to prepare children for the world they will live in, we must kill the imagination. "The ideal, of course, would be to cease having children, but that might have some adverse effect upon long-range economic prosperity, besides threatening certain industries with extinction--the manufacturers of tasteless clothing, for instance, and importers of refined sugar."

As one review on the back of the book says, Esolen goes on in a style reminiscent of C. S. Lewis' The Screwtape Letters. With humor and sarcasm, he turns many of the things that we simply accept as part of culture in such a way that one reconsiders-why do we do things the way we do, and what are we doing to our children?

I could go on and on, or write a new post on every chapter. Maybe I shall. But for brevity's sake, I shall share my general thoughts and impressions.

This book has made me wish I had done things better. I wish I had spent less time playing games on the computer and more wandering the woods. I wish I had spent less time wasting time and more time reading. I wish I had read fewer silly kids' books and more fairy tales (the real ones) and classics.

I don't regret a moment of imaginative play with my siblings (apart from time spent arguing with my brother...and that one time I stayed home from youth group because I needed to do the dishes and played orphanage all night instead...). I am grateful for my free childhood, with ready access to the woods, a huge sandbox, and all sorts of things to help the imagination: wood and stones for fires, rags and dress-up stuff for clothing, sheets and boxes and chairs for houses, paper to make money or write letters or keep ledgers, and sticks for anything you might need.

We're well-known for being readers, and I am thankful for my parents reading books to us and indulging our sitting around with noses stuck in yet another book.

But our standard isn't other people, and just because most people don't read anything, doesn't excuse me for not reading as much as I ought to have.

Expectations have changed. In our fast-paced culture, thinking isn't valued. Doing "nothing" is considered a waste of time-but Facebook, movies, texting, endless trips to the mall, surfing the internet, are not. Few people think. Spending time in thought is weird. Few people write-though as my dad has said, most of the great men in history kept journals.

One thing that struck me in the book was the idea of standardization. Everything is supposed to be the same. You go to school, you do some extracurricular activities in spare time (you really shouldn't have any of that), you go to college, you get a job, you get married, you have kids, you retire, you go on cruises, one immediately on the heels of another (except having kids, of course). No one even considers doing things differently, and if you chance to do so, you've got explaining to do, 'cause nobody understands why you would follow another formula.

As the book says, we want to raise little machines who will function well in the roles we create for them in society. Much free time, much time to think about what is going on and why, and you'll get people who won't conform to society's ideas.

As Christians, this is makes sense. God is a creator who delights in diversity. Just look at the world around you. There are general trends, of course. A snowflake is a snowflake. But no two look just alike. Why? Why not make all things the same? Creation declares the glory of God. In the same way, God works in each life differently. God doesn't use formulas for anything that I can think of. It teaches us to walk by faith.

And the Word says, "Be still and know that I am God." Scripture is full of stories. That is often a means of revealing truth. Clear thinking leads to Him.

We must beware of imagination, because like all other good things on earth, it has been corrupted by sin. But we must also beware of dampening our God-given curiosity. Learn to think for yourself.

"Test all things. Approve of what is good."

That was such fun, I think maybe I will do a post for each chapter.

Camping Pictures and Poems

Spending a number of relaxing days at a campground with my church family, involving lots of kids and being outside, lends itself to many pictures.

From the kids running about everywhere, 

 

 


 



To fun on the slip 'n' slide,

To the twins,







 

 

To sweet family interactions,

To the sword-fighting boys,

To making food outdoors,

 













 

 
To fun at the beach-



 



  

 In the water,










 









 


In the mud,

 




 
 







 









and in the sand-





























To lazying in fields creating daisy chains,

 

 






To adorning each other with them,











 

To nighttime adventures,






 
 












To unending games of volleyball-

Both inside and out-

Even to injuries to make everything more interesting,



























To simply enjoying watching people interact,

To exploring the lake,
 


 

To many rounds of carpet ball,






 

To watching my little buddies,

To making the rounds-

 








by wagon, 

by bike,

by both,

by stroller,











by foot-

 










To being goofy together,


 


 

 
 











To taking walk



 








after walk










until your poor feet are sore:

There's plenty to take pictures of, and too much, in fact.

 
Especially people.

There's portrait

 after portrait

 after portrait

after portrait

 Well...

 You get the idea.

There's lots of opportunity for portraits.

There were so many things to enjoy, most of all fellowship with other believers and with the Lord, that I didn't want to miss. Seeing through the lens of a camera, you notice things you wouldn't otherwise, but you also have a narrowed vision sometimes, making it harder to enjoy the moment sometimes. For this reason I took fewer pictures than I would have.

Good thing, right? Otherwise this post would never end...

One thing I much enjoyed was writing poems with a group of friends. For the first one, we took over the campsite of one family and wrote poems beginning with "For Friendship." This made me think of all that one does because of a friend that one wouldn't otherwise.

And of course I shall add a few more pictures I didn't fit in otherwise.


For Friendship
By Jeannette Beerbower
June 14, 2013

For friendship
Loss of sleep
When there's no need
To count sheep
Though down your eyelids
Want to creep
No sleep
For friendship

For friendship
Tedium endured
Going somewhere
You are bored
On the whim
Of one adored
Tedium endured
For friendship

For friendship
Mental pain
Heartsore for
Another's rain
Longing to lift
Another's drain
Mental pain
For friendship

For friendship
Take delight
Though undesired
In your sight
You now find
That you might
Take delight
For friendship

For friendship
Work undone
Chores are piling
Up a ton
But away from
Them you run
Work undone
For friendship


This exercise was so much enjoyed that I proposed we do it again. We didn't have another starting line, so looking about us all sitting in another's space, I suggested invasion.



What could be more appropriate for the camping trip, where we're all constantly joking about "mooching" off of people, and it's like a big communal picnic, where you go scouting off to see who has the best food whenever you're hungry?

Invade
By Jeannette Beerbower
June 14, 2013

Invasion of the camp
As if a trav'ling tramp
Mooching off of others' food
Sitting there so very rude






Relaxing as if at home
Wherever you happened to roam
Eating whatever is there
Taking over another's chair
Everything we want we raid
Yes, this is indeed how we invade.

Those two ideas summarize much of this wonderful excursion: friendship, which just makes this four-day invasion a joy.

Fellowship with those who know the Lord is sweet.

I can't wait for next year.














And even more, when this joyous fellowship has given us a little glimpse of what heaven must be like, we long for that.