PREAMBLE

PREAMBLE

“Teach a child in the way he should go;

And when he is old, he will not depart from it.”

These words taken from Proverb 22:6 speak loudly of the responsibility of parents and caregivers to the children entrusted to them. In these modern days with the advent of such a large and diverse selection of electronic gadgets, our children are bombarded with so many distractions from every direction that it becomes increasingly difficult to keep up with their spiritual development.

We as adults, often overwhelmed by the demands for survival, are guilty of neglecting our responsibilities of ensuring our children’s growth. We are losing sight of the fact that at this stage children are at their most receptive phase for absorbing information and unless we make an effort to help them, they are likely to acquire wrong information from other sources.

I believe no one is better equipped or better placed to do the job than the parent or the caregiver. By making use of every opportunity to teach the words of Jesus Christ, to read the Holy Bible as well as by setting personal examples we can build our children’s faith and offer them alternative examples to live by. In this way we can prepare them to deal with the many and varied temptations they will face in life as they go forward.

These stories under the banner “The Old Lady and Ana” grew out of a discussion I had with my cousin Starr Sabga during which we lamented that our children are not being exposed to reading and discussing the bible as we were. We both felt that as a result of this we are missing a very important opportunity to expose them to God’s words and running the risk of losing them.

The stories are strictly my interpretation of selected passages from the Bible based on my Christian education and on my own life experience. They are meant for the younger child, as examples of how we may use day to day experiences to learn about God’s word. They are by no means exhaustive but I trust they may serve to get other parents and caregivers to do the same.

If this happens, then I would consider myself fully rewarded.

Wednesday, March 30, 2011

14. THE OLD LADY AND ANA - LUKE 6:27-31 (Love your Enemies:2)

Ana sat quietly and listened intently as Uncle George spoke to the rest of the family gathered in the living room. He was speaking about his favorite subject, one about which he has spoken quite frequently. He was convinced that Muslims were our bitter enemies and that if they are not stopped they will soon take over the world. He gave many examples of the actions they have undertaken to undermine the Christian countries and the ruthless means they use. After the visitors left, Ana went out to the patio where her grand mother was sitting reading her Bible. She sat next to the old lady and after a while she spoke:

“Gramma is Uncle George correct to treat the Muslim people as our enemies? I always
thought that Jesus said we must love our enemies and not hate them but even forgive
them.”

The old lady paused for a moment and turning to her grand daughter she replied in a slow and deliberate manner making sure that Ana heard and understood every word:

“Yes my dear you are absolutely right. Throughout the Holy Scriptures, Jesus
repeated over and over that we must not only love our enemies, but forgive them and
do good to them. Let me read what the disciple Luke wrote in chapter 6:27-31”:



But I tell you who hear me:
Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you.
Bless those who curse you.
Pray for those who mistreat you.
If someone strikes you on one cheek,
Then turn to him the other also.
If someone takes your cloak,
Then do not stop him from taking your tunic.
Give to everyone who asks you,
And if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back.
Do to others as you would have them do to you.
The old lady paused briefly to allow Ana to assimilate the words she had just read, then continuing she said:
“God is a God of love. He makes no exceptions whatsoever and expects us, as his
followers, to be no different. The very reason he sent his only son, Jesus, to suffer and
die is that we should learn to be true Christians according to his teaching.
He did not mince words when he told us to love our enemies and to help those who hate us. The world is full of hate and envy and pain and suffering, and by trying to confront this or ignore it only makes it worse.
Just look at the world today and you will see what happens when there is no love or caring or respect, only hate.
Instead of trying to understand and accommodate others who think different than us and to follow God’s teachings of Love and Respect, we choose to make them enemies and try to destroy them. So we end up going to war with indiscriminate death and destruction of innocent people on all sides.
The situation is heart breaking because when it reaches this level, we ignore God’s wishes and replace it with hate and distrust. Your Uncle George is a just small example of this.

Ana, appearing to understand what her grand mother was trying to explain, interrupted the old lady by noting:

“Is this why God said that we should bless those who curse us, or pray for those who
mistreat us, or allow them to strike us or take our clothes. That is so hard to do!”

The old lady paused awhile to consider what she wanted to say to make sure that Ana receives the right guidance;

"Indeed you are correct. God offers us no alternative but to live by his principles of love and respect. The only way to deal with an enemy is not to attack or reject him but try to understand and accommodate. By thinking good things, by blessing him and speaking good you not only do the will of God, but you remove a reason for him to fear you and hate you and above all you find a reason to replace your own suspicion with love.
The world teaches us to hate and to seek revenge on those who harm us, but Jesus teaches us to forgive and to bless our wrongdoers. The world teaches us to be selfish, to lie or cheat or to ignore others, put ourselves ahead of everyone, to do what we have to get what we want at all cost. But Jesus teaches us mercy, and love and respect to all."

At this point, the old lady sat up, closed her bible and turning to little Ana she took a deep slow breath and continued:

“My dear Ana in my lifetime I have seen so many enemies who after periods of hate, and wars and killings have, with God’s graces, come to live in peace and love. Think of Germany and the rest of Europe, or of Russia (the evil empire) and the Western nations, or of Vietnam and China and the United States, or of Israel and Egypt. After years of being mortal enemies, they now are so closely inter-related that you would not believe that they were once determined to destroy one another. So you see my dear, irrespective of what Uncle George and others are saying of the “Muslim scourge”, I believe that this too will be resolved and God’s love will come shining through."

Ana, clearly relieved, jumped up, grabbed her grandmother with joyful enthusiasm and shouted as she ran off:

“God is a God of Love and you Gramma, are his true disciple”.
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