Losing My Marbles

Our children are very marble-conscience. They can earn one or five by making good choices and loose just as many (or all) by making poor ones. There are certain chores that have a marble-attached value to them, but mostly they are dispensed as we observe kindness, selflessness and obedience, letting them know when we've taken note (if they haven't already heard the clink of glass on glass). If their marbles reach a certain number at week's end, they get to participate in a family fun event. For all the incentives/chore charts/house rules posters that lay in the wastelands of my parental efforts at civilizing our "energetic" crew, this system has, generally speaking, been effective. Until recently, we've been satisfied by it's ability to motivate.

There has been an increase of traffic to where ever we are at, reporting a kind deed or completed-chore-without-being asked by the do-gooder him/herself. We will heartily commend them. And then after a slight pause, it comes:

"So. Do I get a marble for that?"

Now we are reviewing this system as we need to work out the more complicated part of addressing motivation, of explaining that each of us are contributors to this household, and our acts of selflessness should not be done to be bragged over or begging of reward for.

"Mom, will you give me five dollars if I do all the wash right now?"

The older ones are now moving on to money. Marbles for currency are no longer enough.

With either marbles or money, it would be far easier to stick with the "you do this, you get that" mentality of this marble system, yet the hard work of explemlifying and explaining doing what needs to be done because we are many members learning to live with and love each other the best we can is worthy of the messy work that comes beyond cause-and-effect.

***

Talking to friends last night over aged cheese and wine (feeling aged ourselves), we spoke of the pendulum that swings between generations. Growing up in the height of 1980's evangelical movement, full of (mostly) well-intentioned messages emulating faith-based behaviors (abstinence, church attendance, Bible study, clean living for clear testimonies), it seems many of our generation-and those just behind us-have swung from faith to works. The new look of the Christian woman of today is one of ethnically made jewelry and tee-shirts declaring a "heart" for adoption/anti-slavery/eradicating disease. We are invited to parties/seminars/movements /missions trips/service projects/sponsor marathons that seek to change the world in multiple ways. We ink our bodies with love, peace and hope--or at least wear them etched in silver pendants around our necks. There are more men and women willing to go to dark places, exposing to many the desperate plights of those caught in unimaginable circumstances. In many ways, it is a truly exciting movement of feet on the ground, of people discontent to merely fill their heads with more knowledge and who desire to bring Light into the dark.

In other ways, it has become very easy to jump on bandwagons and play the part by pasting our Facebook walls, Instagrams and conversations with our intentions in order to gain attention for being part of a generation who seeks to step out of the old and into the new. It CAN be a part that is tempting to play without much sacrifice or deep-hearted participation.

I write this only because it is true for me. I much prefer to present myself as a humble person, mostly because I am precisely the opposite. God has very quietly awakened something in my heart as He's nudged me in closer contact with those of whom I have little in common (only because I didn't chose who I was born to). I somehow feel closer to Jesus being with those who have little status, image or reputation to lean on. There is so much to learn, so little I know. Yet, it is humiliating to admit, I was tempted on my FIRST VISIT to take a picture with one of the individuals and post it to my Instagram and Facebook...for the sake of "exposure to their need", or so I told myself. But I knew. I knew that if, on the very first foray into the fray I was wanting to photograph myself doing it, it was for the sake of my name only. I wanted to hear the clink  of good opinion falling in my favor.

I mean, YUCK.

How quickly the feet of those who bring good news (me) can be revealed to be on a mission of self-promotion.

***

A few words have recently offered themselves as a mirror to my attention-seeking tendencies.

"Be especially careful when you are trying to be good so that you don't make a performance out of it. It might be good theater, but the God who made you won't be applauding."

"When you help someone out, don't think about how it looks. Just do it--quietly and unobtrusively. That is the way your God, who conceived you in love, working behind the scenes, helps you out."

-Matthew 6:1&4

So there is that.

Then there is this. My friend, Peter Greer writes in his thought-provoking and timely book, The Spiritual Danger of Doing Good:

"Breaking free of our inflated view of ourselves comes when we ruminate on the amazing story told in scripture. When we orient our view towards God's glory, we get a glimpse of the grand story, one of redemption of wholeness and hope from a very big God. As another songwriter wrote many years ago:

"When I consider your heavens,
the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars, 
which you have set in place,
what is mankind that you are mindful of them,
human beings that you care for them?"

When we turn our eyes away from ourselves, we see that we're not the superheroes-but we're part of a much bigger story than we could have dreamed. 

You and I make lousy superheroes and lousier saviors. And we probably don't look too good in full-body spandex either".

A-to-the-MEN on that (including the Spandex).

***

I am thankful to be part of a generation who is waking up to the need to do good. The prayer must be that our left hands aren't preoccupied with pointing out what our right is doing and for our faith to be happily married to our actions. Those of us who have grown up memorizing the tenants of our faith know that faith without works is dead, useless, without lasting effect (James 2:14-26).

These are the thoughts before me as I consider how to approach my offspring doing good for the sake earning a marble. The truth is, I can struggle in a similar way and considering what my "marbles" are, I would do well to lose them. Only God and I know what's in my jar and why. Only He matters and only from Him, can fulfillment come. Because I am human, there will always be the struggle. Yet, He is patient...and He knows that the reward comes from seeking after Him.

{For anyone reading this who prefers blog posts with neat-and-tidy endings with bullet point suggestions, my deepest apologies. God and I are still working on this and I am a slow learner, which should make me a more patient parent. But it doesn't always}.