TRANSCRIPT: Good morning, Five Minute Families. Welcome to week three of our “It is Well” series. We have talked about how to lead well and how to follow well. This week we will discuss how to grow well. Growing well as a family can be seriously tough.
Here’s an example. Jim left for a weekend mens’ retreat. We had a one-and-a-half-year-old and lived in another country. Our son and I hung out at home because I am a homebody, but without Papa to break up the days, by the end of the weekend, our son was fussy, and I was exhausted and stressed. When Jim got back, he wanted to share all that the Lord had done in his heart that weekend; he had had a “mountaintop” experience. I wanted to want to hear it all, but I also wanted him to understand that his absence was difficult for us; I had been in the “valley” most of the weekend. And, of course, our little one just wanted his papa’s undivided attention. My response to one of the revelations God had given Jim shut down his authentic sharing and drove us further apart for a time.
A time God used for His glory and our good. We needed to grow apart a bit in order to hold tighter to God’s hand – the One who would never leave us or forsake us. The One who at the end of a long weekend apart has nothing to distract Him. What we experienced in the weeks that followed were family growing pains. While we are one in God’s eyes and even with our family focus from the beginning of our marriage, we are still individuals who struggle and need God to show up and show off in mighty personal ways.
If we had not seen that God was working, we could have been resentful (well, I was for a bit, but God is God and He is good All. The. Time.). Jim was responsive to the Word and leading of the Lord, and that is the key to any one growing well. Isaiah 43:18-19 tells us, “Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.”
Now, there are numerous articles out there telling individuals how to grow in Christ. The technical term is the sanctification process. Preachers, teachers, pastors and mentors can guide you in the individual process. What we want to focus in on is how does a FAMILY grow well together, even if a family member is in a completely different spiritually place at that time.
1. Pray for each of your family members individually and collectively. We are sure you have noticed that many of our suggestions include prayer. Obviously, it is implicitly indicated in all that a Five Minute Family should be doing, but sometimes, we point it out because the situation is more delicate. Growth can cause pain, but growth is necessary.
2. Listen when one of your loved ones shares what God is doing in his or her life, even if – well, especially if – you have already received that lesson from the Lord. Letting your loved one share what God is doing is praise worthy and important to their individual growth and your family’s collective growth as a unit.
3. Speak up only when God prompts you. As a talker, I pray a quick prayer that God will zip my lips and let me fully be present, listening to my family member, but that doesn’t mean He doesn’t want me to participate, too. Waiting for His prompting to respond has been a continuing lesson for me, but I am amazed every time He gives me the words to speak.
4. Listen again. Most of us connect with someone by sharing our own personal experience with something similar. There is nothing wrong with that, AT TIMES. But, sometimes, we need to remember to listen AGAIN in order for our family member to feel validated in his or her own experience as well as for us to see the uniqueness of what God is doing in their lives, which impacts the whole family.
5. And, accept hard truths. Parents, if we have failed to do something we know that we ought, we must accept the consequences and be willing to grow from our past mistakes. Kids, sometimes you do not understand the totality of a situation. If you don’t accept the hard truths from your parents, you will not grow well.
One of the reasons we started Clear View Retreat was to encourage families to grow well together. We want to provide a common language for parents and children so that when the mountaintop experiences occur, we celebrate them together and when the valleys loom large, we traverse them together. Remember, Five Minute Families, as God writes in 2 Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.”
Please check us out at clearviewretreat.org. We pray that you grow well and be blessed.