Our Family -- Memorial Day Traditions

I have been VERY busy for a few weeks, so I am sorry for the delay in postings a couple of times recently. We have been busy trying to get the spring work done. We are also trying to paint our living room and patch up some of the drywall mistakes that we made 35 years ago when we built our home! Anyway, it takes a lot of time and so I haven’t been able to keep posting as regularly as I would like.

I decided that with the Memorial Day holiday this weekend, I would focus on some things related to that. First of all, having grown up in a home of teachers and having been a teacher for a few years and having been married to a teacher for almost 38 years, Memorial Day has always held a special place in our hearts. Aside from the patriotic significance, Memorial Day always marked the “almost end” of the school year and it meant that soon we would all be “free”!!! So we always approached Memorial Day with much joy and anticipation of summer and the outings that would take place along with a trip that was always in the offing!

I will first touch on the patriotic significance and mention that though our country is having a multitude of issues now, we still live in the greatest country on earth and for that we should be VERY thankful!!! Having grown up in a home with a dad who fought in WW II (he was in the Pacific – Iwo Jima and Guam), I am very grateful for the men and women who gave their lives for our freedom! May we never forget the sacrifice of those patriots!

So the first tradition we had in our home when our children were growing up (and we still do it today with our grandchildren!) was to be sure we were up and ready to attend the parade that we always had in our small town. The parade was nothing to write home about, but the Vets always proudly carry the American flag and we wave our flags and clap for their bravery that still gives us chills in our spines even today! Then we walk the ¾ mile up to the cemetery where we stand and listen to the local high school band play the “Star Spangled Banner” and we hear a speaker share of the blessings of living in America before “Taps” is played along with a “21 Gun Salute”! It is all VERY moving and gives goose bumps to those of us who are still sensitive and thankful enough for the many ways that God has blessed our great country! Then the kids get to climb on the official cannon and the stack of 100 shells that was placed overlooking the “soldiers plot” in the cemetery in 1897.

The rest of the traditions that I will be talking about are more related to the fun part of just being together for the holiday and the food that accompanies our picnics on that day. One of the things we usually did that was not the favorite activity of the day for the kids, was planting the garden! We always had to kind of “bribe” the kids with the other fun activities of the day in order to get them to do the work with a happy face! Living here in Michigan necessitates our planting the annual plants on Memorial Day weekend or later in order to avoid losing them to late spring frosts.

After planting the gardens (flower and vegetable) there was always a fun picnic – usually in our own back yard to avoid the crowds that would surely be at Lake Michigan where we loved to go for many of our outings. There were usually some grandparents at our picnics, and if we were especially blessed, there might be some cousins, but there were always favorite foods that we could count on as part of our Memorial Day traditions! I am going to include some of our favorite recipes so that you can share them with us and get a “flavor” of what we enjoyed on Memorial Day!

I want to include three simple recipes that we often use on Memorial Day for our gatherings. One is for shish-ka-bobs, one for fruit pizza and one for refreshing summer punch.

SHISH-ka-BOBS

• Meat enough for your family – I use chicken, beef and hotdogs
  Cut into pieces about one inch square
• Vegetables enough for your family – I use green peppers, green onions and mushrooms
• Your favorite marinade – I make my own
• Cut everything and place in a large bowl with a cover. Pour marinade over the meat and let sit all together for at least 24 hours –the longer, the better
• On Memorial Day, place items on skewers and grill over your grill! (Sometimes the veggies cook more quickly than the meat, so it may be helpful to use separate skewers for the meat and the veggies.

FRUIT PIZZA

Make your favorite chocolate chip cookie dough. Flatten it out into 2 large circles on 2 large cookie sheets. Bake at 350 for 12 – 15 minutes. Cool.
Make topping using one pkg cream cheese, 8 oz. Cool whip and ½ cup powdered sugar. Spread over cooled cookie crust. Top with your favorite fruits, cleaned and cut. Cut into wedges and serve.

SUMMER PUNCH
Place one 12 oz. can of frozen orange juice in a large pitcher.
Use two mint tea bags to make about two cups of very strong mint tea.

Mix the above together and pour about two inches in a large glass. Fill glass to the top with Ginger Ale and ice and enjoy.

As I close this post, just let me say that kids LOVE tradition! Be sure you have lots of traditions that your children can carry with them! They love to talk to others and share the things they do “at their house”! Let your traditions be related to holidays or just to life, but have them!!!!

Loving Your Children - Part VI

Discipline Your Children (continued)

In the last entry, I talked about reaching your child’s heart in your discipline. It is very important in all of your child rearing days that your goal is to reach your child’s heart. Discipline and training that is expressly for the purpose of changing behavior without reaching the heart is pretty ineffective in the big picture of discipline.

One point that I wanted to add to last week’s discussion, is to dispel the idea that is pervasive in today’s culture and that is the whole idea of “time outs” or what we used to call “grounding”, especially for young children. Now I don’t have any Bible verses that say that this type of discipline is not effective, but from my own personal experience and from seeing what happens in homes where this type of discipline is regularly practiced, I want to say that in general this type of discipline is pretty ineffective. First of all, though Scripture doesn’t say not to use the other, it does definitely come down in favor of physical discipline. Proverbs 13:24 says. “He that spareth his rod hateth his son: but he that loveth him (his son) chasteneth him betimes (promptly NKJV).” This verse pretty much rules out long stretched out forms of discipline. Punishment needs to be swift and the relationship needs to be reinstated. When discipline is administered properly, there is a sense of a broken relationship that the child needs to have repaired as soon as possible. If there is a prolonged form of punishment, then it is that much longer before the relationship can be fully restored. One other principle has to do with the idea that as parents we get tired and we can get distracted in our goal and we can easily back off on following through with a long drawn out punishment. This sends the wrong signal to the children. It is usually better with young children to discipline with something that gets over soon and allows the relationship to resume normally.

Discipline, of course, involves more than physical punishment. Discipline involves teaching and training as well. You need to spend time building Godly habits into the lives of your children as well as punishing them when they do wrong. This refers back to something I said earlier and that is that child rearing takes time! It isn’t something that can be done in between all of the other activities of life. It needs to BE your life for as long as it takes. Your children are among the people that you would like to take to Heaven with you and that makes it worth the time! Mothering is a job, but it is more than a job, it is a way of life. It is never over and there are no vacations. But the rewards are better than time off and vacations!

One more issue that I would like to touch on before we leave this topic is to look out for the tricks (“foolishness”) that is “bound up in the heart of your child”. One of the initial lessons that must be learned by a child is the lesson of who is the boss. I want to keep this short, so I will just tell you that when you tell your child to do something, he needs to do it. He needs to do it now and he needs to do it the way you told him to do it! It is great fun for a child to determine how much of your command he needs to follow. There should be very RARE instances when things are open for negotiation. For instance, if you tell him to sit beside you on a chair, he shouldn’t be allowed to sit beside his friend on another chair without your permission. If you desire that he just sit down and you don’t care where, then don’t tell him to sit beside you. If you desire that he sit beside you and you tell him that, then he needs to be obedient and do just as you said. Children are very good at changing the instruction to fit their desires and to show a little bit of control. Don’t be fooled by that. Biblically, parents have control until it is gradually handed over to the child as he shows himself to be mature enough to handle it. Make sure that your children know that you are in charge and that you will give them authority for their own decisions as you see fit.

Well, I think I have covered the topics on loving your children as thoroughly as I plan to at this time. There are many more topics that could be covered, but I think that next time I will move on to something else. I trust these thoughts have been helpful and encouraging to you as you seek to raise Godly children for Him!

Loving Your Child -- Part V

Discipline Your Child

Many of these topics that I am covering are topics that could fill many books, but I am trying to give the highlights in a very short form! This topic for today is one of those!

When we mention discipline, we all have differing ideas of what exactly that means. There isn’t a lot of Scripture that speaks directly to this issue, but there are many principles derived from Scripture that are very helpful.

One of the main principles that I have come to kind of understand over my years of raising children, is the principle of reaching the heart of the child. The Bible tells us in Proverbs 4:23 “Keep your heart with all diligence, for out of it spring the issues of life.” Proverbs 2:10&11b tells us “When wisdom enters your heart, and knowledge is pleasant to your soul, discretion will preserve you…” We also know that “the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked…”, Jeremiah 17:9. So you see, the issue is the heart! We must find out how to reach the hearts of our children!

By shear difference in size and bulk, it is somewhat easy for a parent to force a young child to conform to his desires as parent. But what happens when that is the goal, to make kids do what we want them to do by simple force, there will come a time that all of your human efforts will fail and you will be left frustrated and bewildered.

The goal should be to reach into the child’s heart with teaching and patient understanding and firm discipline and seek God’s Holy Spirit to make changes in the heart that will transform the child for his lifetime. Outward changes that take place in behavior are very fleeting, but the inward changes of the heart brought about by the Holy Spirit will open that heart to God’s leading and influence in the life of that child. This is one of many reasons why secular counseling and rehab programs don’t work. They are focusing on changing life patterns from the outside and they are not working on changing the heart.

So, how do we change the heart of a child? The truth is that we can’t do that. We can only be the instruments God uses to accomplish that. So we need to look into God’s Word and find many verses that give us guidelines for that task and also the hope that it can indeed be done!

The first principle, and the only one that I will discuss today, is found in Proverbs 22:15. “Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child; the rod of correction will drive it far from him.” To some this may seem like an unloving thing to do. However the Scripture says just the opposite. "He who spares his rod hates his son, but he who loves him disciplines him promptly," Proverbs 13:25.

As we are all quite aware, spanking a child is not acceptable today and indeed could, if done at the wrong place at the wrong time, cause a person to spend some time in jail. However, as I have mentioned in the past, we are not under the laws of man and are ultimately accountable to God. We find the guidelines for our lives in God’s Word and if God tells us to spank our children, there must be good reason for that! Spanking needs to be done wisely and carefully and not indiscriminately. And since our culture is very down on spanking, there is no need to test the system and try spanking in the store! Keep up good communication with your children and let them know ahead of time that if they misbehave at the store, they WILL receive their punishment when they get home and then FOLLOW THROUGH! Children are usually three or four before they will purposely test your authority in the store, so by then they can understand the word “spank” and that should be a deterrent if you have used this method of discipline at home. In this area of spanking, consistency and follow-through are the foundational necessities! If you are not consistent and there is no follow-through, obedience will be very sporadic at best! And one more thing: make the spanking hurt! (This does NOT mean physical damage.) If they come out of the spanking and there are no tears, you probably didn’t accomplish much. And as you begin to reach their hearts effectively, there will be tears of remorse over the broken relationship even if the spanking didn’t hurt all that much.

Next time I will continue this discussion, but this gives you something to think about and a place to start. May God bless your family and may you raise Godly and obedient children for Him!!!