Seeing Our New World



We’d met at the park, so her kids could play. From a nearby bench we could keep an eye on all the action while talking about motherhood, marriage, her full-time job, and marvel that sanity was still possible.

Janet pulled a news magazine from her bag. She flipped it open to a page revealing the photographic journalism we’ve come to expect but never can un-see. I looked at the bloody image of a dead boy—carried by a woman bearing the weight of far more than her brutalized child. I cringed.

“Julie saw this.” Janet shook her head as she quickly slipped the magazine back into her bag. “She asked me what had happened. What do you tell a seven-year-old about people who kill children?”





I thought back to when my kids were young and we’d sing, It’s A Small World After All. We learned about far away places and cultures, but even with different languages, clothes, and homes, people were still people—with a purpose and passion to live. 

Our kids used to have a childhood and then learn about the problems as they grew older.








But today is a new world. How do you explain why someone would behead a child or why a nine-year-old girl should be a sex slave? 

When the history books are written about the 21st Century will it be noted how some nations turned back the centuries and became barbaric slave traders again? 


Back when Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir led her nation, she famously said, “We can forgive the Arabs for killing our children. We cannot forgive them for forcing us to kill their children. We will only have peace with Arabs when they love their children more than they hate us.”

Evil is all about hate.

After the 9/11 terrorist attacks, I recall my grandma’s wisdom: we can’t always understand evil, but we can do one thing to solve it: Love. Then she quoted from the Bible: “Do not let evil defeat you; instead, conquer evil with good.” Romans 12:21

Even though our kids see the evil, we can teach them to use goodness to defeat it. Teaching goodness in an increasingly evil world? It's the best weapon we have.


Preemptive Love offers help to the hurting we see.

Popular posts from this blog

Dreaming the Dream

Image
Dreaming big dreams about the future is easy for kids. The only thing standing in the way is time.  Kid’s dreams are not about skills, or opportunities, or even practicality. Those things come much later.  My grandson hopes to be professional soccer player when he grows up. This week, a small piece of his dream came true when his Boys and Girls Club was invited to participate in pre-game activities with the Seattle Sounders Football Club.  He got to suit up in a real jersey and walk on the field with a real pro player. Imagine a young soccer player looking up to who he hopes to be one day. If you haven’t taken the time to talk to a child about their future dreams—you should.  They believe. As we get older we sometimes forget that dreams fuel our hopes—and that's something we all need. So, do you still dream? Or have you left those childhood thoughts behind?  S pending time with children will  inspire you to believe agai
Read more

Sexy Selfies: Posting for attention

Image
We’ve all seen the “selfie” pix on Facebook—those self-taken images in varying forms of dress (or undress). Usually they’re female poses taken in public restrooms, dressing rooms, bedrooms, and lots of what used to be private space. Thanks to selfies and social media, it’s open season on privacy—and modesty. Do you have a social media “friend” who has become a serial selfie? Most often selfies are young girls sharing their sexiness with the world. Serial selfies post hundreds of pictures, so it’s hard to ignore the display. The question is why do they do it. While I don’t approve of the sexy display of serial selfies, insecurity is at the root. Selfies collect “likes” to boost morale. The attention received is like a balm to their broken spirits. But the dark side of exhibitionism is feeling used—not unlike the girl searching for love and giving away her body in hopes of finding love. Selfies seek approval. They're locked in a perpetual cycle of posting pi
Read more

Wild or Tame? Which One Are You?

Image
Finally! Research that explains why I act the way I do. Columbia University’s Motivational Science Center studied people’s activities and what brought them the most happiness. Even more telling were how those activities changed as they aged. Twenty-somethings tend to equate happiness with high-energy activities. Words like excited and ecstatic are usually attached to spontaneous things—even risky things—and living life full throttle.  Researchers labeled this Promotion Motivation —the urge to take chances, including career moves that may not work out. Happiness comes from happenings—the more happenings, the more happiness. By age forty, adults associate happiness with things running smoothly at work and home. It’s also about feeling secure in relationships. Keeping healthy matters more too. This behavior is called Prevention Motivation —and people are more concerned with preserving and maintaining the things they value. It appears that time ofte
Read more