Thursday, July 29, 2010

The New Church, Part 2

*Okay, now this part of the post is going to sound like venting and that's because that's what it is. What I don't want it to sound like is that "my child is perfect and never does anything wrong" the point I'm trying to make with the following story is that when your children are being taught/cared for by someone else that you run the risk of exposing your children to someone who does not have the same vision as you in discipline/morals etc. We've adopted a rather strict discipline procedure in our home. (See "Shepherding a Childs Heart" and "Raising Godly Tomatoes") I'll be sure to address our specific methods in another post. *



We attended the church for about a year. I had found out I was pregnant 2 days before our first day at church and Mikey was around 6 weeks when we stopped going.



I liked the church, don’t get me wrong. It was very uplifting and a great time. The “offering plate” was a very large dutch oven at the back of the church where you could drop money in and no one would could judge. The music was varied in style but always performed by a guy with a guitar and excellent singing voice. Everyone was nice……



So why did we stop going, you ask? The bottom line was: We needed more. The preaching was basic, good messages but not a lot of depth, with an emphasis on spending time daily in the Word . Jason and I checked that one off our list. At first mention of reading proverbs daily we did it and then expanded our time to include a chapter or two from a book, working through the New Testament. We wanted to know more, we wanted a better understanding of Jesus. It seemed that we were only skimming the top of deep subject matter that needed more consideration.



Issue number 2 was the preacher not liking children. I do believe he was joking when he said “I don’t like kids” in front of the congregation and I took it as: well, everyone has their weaknesses. Afterall, I had never been *good* with kids either.



But it didn’t take us long to realize that children were not welcome. From day one Jacob had gone into the nursery because, well, that’s where children go. They started taking volunteers for said nursery from the congregation, everyone was supposed to have their turn. I got nervous, I didn’t know these people?! We began having problems.



Every day when we would go to pick Jacob up he had done something (i.e. pushed a kid, took a toy away) that required discipline but instead of sending someone for me they would just stick him in time out.

I can just hear his little mind working, “Time out? That’s all you got?” as he laughed to himself and continued his shenanigans every Sunday.



I expressed to them that I needed to punish him when he acted badley but they would tell me not to worry about it “he was just being a boy”.

Hmmmmm. Observations of the nursery and interactions between the caregivers and the tots confirmed that there was more gossip going on than actual caregiving. For those of you with toddlers (or who once had toddlers) you know that if you don’t watch them you can’t train them, that disputes can be stopped before they start, if you’re watching.

The last straw was when one of the lovely ladies brought my son to me (hand clenched around his wrist, his arm fully extended up, her with a bitter expression plastered on her face) and told me he had pushed a “baby” down.



“oh my goodness!” I replied and started to talk to Jacob, he knew that was unacceptable and by placing his hand over his bottom to guard it he knew what was about to happen to him. When the “angry lady” realized that a spanking was about to take place her demeanor changed, smiling she said “It’s okay, just don’t do it again” He was just being “a boy”.

!?!?!

I left chuch that day downright angry, I mean which was it? Was he misbehaving or wasn’t he? Had the incident been an accident? Jason was beside himself and said that if we did go back Jacob would no longer be in the nursery.



After much prayer I realized I only had myself to blame. Whose child was he? He was my child. Why was I letting others train My child? Uuuhhhhhh………

To Be continued, again = )

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