Do You Have Homework?

Most of us who grew up with nagging parents (thank God for them! Whew what the world needs now is another generation of parents of the nagging kind that kept our hind-parts warm.  And I’m not talking about child abuse either.) heard these words every day after school.  And most of us are now grateful.  I know I am.  As I write this it is past my “regular” bed time mom and dad, but what’s regular these days?  I’m six hours ahead of you.  Nah nah nah nah nah.  LOL!!  Some of us just received some disconcerting news about a minister’s son in the United States, and also another celebrity gospel singer, and we began to ask ourselves and each other, and finally the Lord, “what’s going on?”  “What went wrong?”  Where are we missing it for things like this to be happening to and by PKs i.e.  Preacher’s Kids?  Yes, we are human just like the rest of us.  No, we were not born perfect just because our parents are ministers.  Yes, we want to play and misbehave and be normal and abnormal just like everyone else.  Why not?  Everyone else is doing it!  And making it look fun too.  What makes us so different?  Why do we have to be perfect while the rest of the world gets off scott free (who chose that name anyway?  Why not “Joe free” or “Jane free”?  or even “Willy free”?  Just a thought.) to enjoy the decadent things in life? LOL!

Then when everyone else gets tired of playing in the dirt and wants to take a bath, they come to “our” house i.e. the church and choose what we’ve been forced to eat and wear all along for they see it is the good way.  Hmmm.  Then we trade places and WE go out and play in the dirt for a minute and the world declares we’re the worst on earth because we are PKs.  Hmmmm.  I have to speak up for the PKs and explain, not make excuses mind you, why we seem to be so “bad” when in fact we’re not bad at all, nor any different from anyone else.  We’re just born into families with a public  and highly visual and visible mission that has been misused, abused, accused, elevated and degraded at the same time (like they did Jesus:  “Hosanna!” today and “Crucify Him!” tomorrow from the same people He loved, taught, healed, prayed for, and raised from the dead.).  Yes, I’m a PK too and living under a microscope is a very tiny and narrow life.  Not much space to breathe much less burp, okay?

As we philosophized and made sure we were not gossiping or criticizing others, it seems the Lord began to answer our questions right away and His answer through my heart was this:  Preachers (whether they are televangelists, pastors, prophets, etc.) forget, or just fail to do their homework.  This is where the ball gets dropped.  They become so busy, too busy “saving the world” i.e. missions, aids, leprosy, street ministries, megachurches and megaministries, the money, the traveling, the numbers, the souls, the . . . they forget about Jerusalem – home.  Home is supposed to be where the heart is.  Home is where your wife and/or husband is, the children and the dog and cat, hamsters and rabbits, the leaking roof, the softball and baseball games, the plays, the band and choir concerts at school, intramural sports, the family gatherings and reunions, the talks around Monopoly, Clue and Go to The Head of the Class, grace at the dinner and breakfast meals, discussions and hugs, corrections and hugs, disciplines and hugs and kisses, bath time and bed time and hugs, and eye contact and listening, sex education and listening, mom and dad cuddling, arguing, concluding and hugging and kissing, and . . .  You get the picture?  And no the Cleavers and the Huxtables are not the only families that can have it all.  Your family, my family can have it all, but it takes time.  Making time for each other and what’s important.  It’s time to do your homework Sam.  It’s time to do your homework Sally.  It’s time to do your homework mom.  It’s time to do your homework dad.

You see, we all have homework to do.  It doesn’t stop just because we graduated from school.  Oh no.  Once we marry, we start all over again.  And when we have children, we enter graduate school where the homework never ends.  LOL!!  Fathers, the more time you spend with your daughters listening to them and not berating or hitting or molesting them, the more you build them up to be a whole woman so they will know what a real man is.  The more you hug and hold them the right way, the less they will need to be hugged and sexed by boys the wrong way – at any age.  For a fake man and a wanna-be-a-man is just that, a boy.  Daddy, the more time you spend with your son building up his self-esteem and not hitting him and punching him and not telling him lies like “real men don’t cry”, the less they will look to other boys and men, and boys to men for affection which can lead to misapplied affection, and you know what I mean.  That’s not the topic of this blog, but we will keep it real.  (Thanks Dave Chappelle!)  Dads, the more time you spend in the presence of the Lord dealing with your hidden stuff - things from your childhood and unfinished business with your parents etc., stuff nobody knows about, but you’re carrying it in your spirit and subliminally passing it on to your children, who then are doing stuff “you don’t know where they got it from” (duh, the nut never falls too far from the tree.) – the less burdens your children and you will have to carry and deal with in a psychiatrist’s office or prison cell in their teenage and adult years.  Dad, it's time to do your homework, please.

Moms, the more time you spend being your daughter’s best friend by being her loving mom, and not being jealous of the beauty that came from your body, and not being jealous of her relationship with her dad, (just because yours wasn’t all that great doesn’t mean you have to take it out on your daughter), the less likely she will run away from home into the arms of the first boy who gives her a first look and a kiss and tap on her behind, i.e. rocks her world and his baby, and the less likely she’ll want to keep spending the night at her best “girlfriend’s” house becoming something she was not created to be.  Moms, the more time you spend with your sons not nagging or degrading their growing manhood even if you can’t feel the invisible chin hairs he says are there (agree with him, for one day they will be, and he’s looking to you to affirm him as his daddy’s son, and that he’s good enough to get a good woman like you.) the less he will find it necessary to look to young immature and exotic (what the heck is that anyway?) philly’s to affirm him as a “man”.  Mom’s, the more time you spend in the presence of the Lord allowing Him to heal your hurts from the past, and helping you detox from disappointments and broken dreams, jealousies and depression, the less likely you will pass on the invisible phantom of bitterness to your children for them to deal with as teens and adults and wonder why they are so bitter towards you and difficult to talk to.  Mom, it's time to do your homework, please.

Moms and dads, the more time you spend with each other gazing into each other’s eyes like you did when you first fell in love with each other and couldn’t get enough of each other and never wanted to be apart from each other, the less time you’ll have to look at the form of other men and women, and the less space there will be between you to gaze  into the eyes of others.  The more time you spend breathing each other’s air the less you will be attracted to the perfume and cologne of those passing by.  The more time you spend building each other up spiritually, emotionally and psychologically the stronger your bond will become and the less the spiritual forces will be able to tear you apart; the stronger the foundation will become for your children and they won’t want anything less for themselves when it’s their turn to marry and make a family.  Do your homework please.

Before the prophet Samuel was conceived  his mother promised to give him to the Lord, and she kept her word.  After he was weaned off of diapers and bottles, she took him to the temple as a young child and gave him to the priest Eli to be trained for the work of the Lord for Israel.  Well during this time, the priest Eli wasn’t doing a good job of raising his own sons in the house of the Lord, and they began to abuse the people and take their money and offerings, etc.  (So you see this didn’t just start in our days and times folks.  Are you shocked?) and they disrespected the Lord right in the temple, and also had sex with the young phillys or Phillies (my computer capitalized that second one.)  See I Samuel 2:12-18, 26-36; 3:10-15; 4:10-11.  Hophni and Phineas died in the war as judgment against them.  But watch this.  Eli was Samuel’s example of a father and guess what happened?  Samuel also failed to raise his sons well.  I Samuel 8:1-5.  Samuel was a good man and the Lord trusted him, but he failed to do his homework, and thus did not leave behind a positive legacy of fatherhood/parenthood.  Children do not become good citizens by osmosis, nor are they born that way.  They must be raised on purpose, otherwise we cannot cry “accident” when they’re allowed to grow like weeds or according to the panoramic view surrounding them.

Oh, when we finally slow down our fast-paced lives, and self-centered and gold-digging mentalities, put the tyranny of the urgent on the back burner for a minute, we can and will change our lives, our families, our cities and our communities.  “Yes we can”!  President Barack Obama.  Yes we can, if we are willing to stop and smell the coffee (I prefer hot chocolate myself, but a cappuccino with lots of cream will do nicely too.), watch Barney with the kids (please bring back Electric Company! And the old Sesame Street.), read more books together (heck write your own stories with your kids based on your everyday experiences with each other.  Sell those buggers and start a family business, together!) roll on the floor wrestling and laughing and playing games.  Aah, yes it is possible, I know it is.  It just depends on what’s important to you, and what’s important to you will become important to your children.  Don’t look at them strangely when they act in certain ways.  Look in the mirror first because you were here first.  You are the first one they saw when they were born, just like the duck when it was hatched.  The first thing it saw was a chicken.  No wonder he acted like a dog.  LOL!!!  This is the fun homework we miss because we’re all WORK and no play.  Homework can be fun.  It’s all how you look at it and what you decide is most important.  So the next time you hear an unsavory story about PKs, or really anyone, I know we all make our own decisions but remember:  we all started somewhere.  We all have our foundation somewhere, and when a house is leaning, the first place we must look to try and save it is the foundation.

So, I’ll ask you again.  Do you have any homework? :-)   I think the answer for all of us is “yes”, whether single or married, parent or childfree.  Yes mom and dad, I have homework.  Let’s get it done, so we can enjoy the rest of the “day”.