What I Learned from a 14 Year Old This Week

My friend received an email from her son’s middle school teacher this week. This was part of the message: …I wanted to thank you for raising such a nice young man and let you know of your son’s admirable behavior yesterday. A student in class was very loudly disrespectful to me and your son spoke up and told that boy, “Don’t talk to her like that.” The email went on to say that the other students took their attention away from the disrespectful student and noticed more that her son had had the courage to be an ‘upstander’.

As I read the words of the email, I was proud and ashamed all at once. I was super proud of my friend’s child because he’s an amazing young man, but at the same time, I was ashamed of myself. Many situations ran through my mind of times when I had simply sat by and not addressed inappropriate behavior. Of course, as a classroom teacher, I had certainly done so. But when it comes to my peers and my family, I have often pretended I just didn’t see or hear, or simply walked away not knowing how to respond, just trying to keep the peace. So I asked myself, “Why didn’t you speak up?” My answer was, I was fearful that I might lose a friend, or push someone’s buttons and send them into a rage, or lose a relationship with someone that I loved deeply and possibly run them out of my life forever. When I realized that the root of those decisions was fear, I recognized that I had been deceived into believing that peace was more important than truth. No decision made out of fear, unless it’s something ridiculous, like skydiving or riding a bull, should be made because of fear. I hate fear and all that it represents. I know where it comes from and I absolutely agree with the song lyrics by Zach Williams that so perfectly “calls out” fear by saying, “Fear is a Liar!” It’s a great song, by the way.

1 John 4:18 says, “Perfect love casts out all fear”. If we sincerely love people, we need to stand up to them when we see them doing wrong. Maybe we shouldn’t do it at the exact moment, but later on, in private…in love. We don’t genuinely love people if we don’t want to help them grow. 2 Timothy 1:7 states, “For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline.” Many years ago, I was an instructional aide at an elementary school. One day, one of the teachers I worked with, made a first grade student cry. The student ran over to me and grabbed me around the legs sobbing, desperately seeking my help. I was heartbroken for the child, because from my perspective, the teacher was the one with the inappropriate behavior. I went back to the teacher several days later (that’s how long it took me to muster up the courage to have a conversation that I knew wasn’t going to go well). I privately let her know that I didn’t approve of how she treated the child. Needless to say, she very quickly put me in my place by reminding me that I worked under her supervision and had no right to question anything she said or did in HER classroom. The years went by, I became a teacher, and we would occasionally bump into each other; we usually both tried to avoid one another. But eventually, after many more years went by, we were able to produce small talk with one another again, and I think she forgave me for getting ‘out of my lane’. I forgave her when I went through menopause and playfully (??) choked my own teacher’s aide one day in class instead of a student (sorry Carolyn)! I guess maybe I was out of line. But, I can truthfully say, I have never regretted that confrontation. I knew in my heart that it was the right thing to do and that maybe, as awkward as it was, that conversation might save another child from mistreatment. However, after that incident, for many years, I was reluctant to confront others because I knew what it could do to a relationship. But today, I am inspired, by a kid named Gabe, who by the way isn’t exactly perfect. His mom just texted me that she had to scream at him three times to get out of bed this morning. Come on mom, being a voice against evil is exhausting work…but, it’s the crystal clear choice

Washing Machines Should Be Inside the House!

“Help! Help! Let me out!” I screamed, as the sweat began to pour down my face. Anger was slowly rising in me like a pot of boiling water. We lived in a ‘tiny house’ before ‘tiny houses’ were cool! So, my husband built a nice little shed in the back yard as a laundry room/tool shed, and I spent lots of time walking back and forth doing laundry.

One hot summer day, I was moving clothes from the washer to the dryer and putting in a new load of clothes. My husband came in the shed, got something and left. He, my daughter and new grandbaby were in the house. When I finished and started back to the house, I pushed on the door and it wouldn’t open. I pushed again – nothing. As I looked through the crack I could see that my husband had bolted the door shut on the outside. He absent-mindedly forgot that I was inside…or so he said! I began banging on the door and screaming, but no one came to my rescue. After several minutes of screaming and knocking, I realized they couldn’t hear me, so I sat down and waited. I thought that after a few minutes they would miss me and come to check. Didn’t happen! So finally, after what seemed like hours in the hot shed, I began to panic, thinking I’d be stuck there the rest of my life! I looked around for a tool. I found a circular saw and figured out how to turn it on. I tried to cut a hole through the door near the bolt so I could reach my hand through and free myself. But, the saw kept jerking like a jackhammer and knocking me backward every time I tried to put the blade against the plywood door. I was finally able to cut a line about 4 inches long, but realized that my plan of creating the hole in the door was hopeless. I sat down again and I was really getting mad by this point. Inside, my daughter said to my husband, “Mom must be building something or hanging a shelf out in the shed, I hear the saw!” Finally, I heard a dog barking, someone was walking down the road in front of the house and our dogs were going crazy. My husband stepped outside to yell at the dogs and I seized the moment to bang on the door and yell again. A few seconds later, he sheepishly unlatched the door and…needless to say, I went crazy on him!!! Yep, I was angry.

James 1:19-20 says this: “Understand this, my beloved brethren, Let every man be quick to hear (a ready listener), slow to speak, slow to take offense and to get angry, For man’s anger does not promote the righteousness God (wishes and requires).” As professing Christians, unrestrained anger is a bad reflection on God. It makes us appear weak and lacking self-control. The scriptures about anger must be embedded in our minds and ready to be applied at a moment’s notice…like when you’re locked in your shed and it’s 110 degrees! Scripture isn’t just a bunch of wise words written a long time ago. It actually contains supernatural power when it is APPLIED in our lives. Knowing the words isn’t enough, memorizing isn’t enough, it’s actually applying the words to our everyday situations that makes them powerful. The crystal clear choice was to control my anger and laugh about my husband’s patterned behavior to lock the door when he left the shed and to choose to believe it was an “accident”.

Granted, there are times when anger is justified, as Jesus himself displayed anger when the temple was being used as a marketplace and when people were just being hard headed. There are also times when we are being mentally or physically abused, when anger is justified. It’s okay to defend yourself or others against abuse, but not in anger. If your response to mistreatment is given in anger, you take the spotlight off of the original wrong and the attention shifts to your wrong response. When anger is your ‘go to’, people withdraw from you. The proverbial ‘walking on eggshells’ becomes a reality in your home. Make a decision today that the next time circumstances activate anger in you, you are waiting for its arrival with these words in hand, “Fools give full vent to their rage, but the wise bring calm in the end” Proverbs 29:11. Don’t be a fool, but put a stackable washer/dryer combo in a closet inside your house just in case!