Angels in the Architecture: A Protestant Vision for Middle Earth by Douglas Jones;Douglas Wilson

Author:Douglas Jones;Douglas Wilson [Wilson, Douglas Jones;Douglas]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2010-10-15T00:51:00+00:00

The most important parts of faithful child rearing are invisible and intangible. We can never figure them out by calculations or churn them out in neat, mechanical, step-by-step processes. They are wisdom, not knowledge. And God doesn't just expect us to grasp the ungraspable for our own peace and fun, but for the working out of all of His purposes throughout history. That's quite a task before us as we stare at our troops-troops wild with jam-smeared faces and milk moustaches.

The Old Testament closes by promising that in the New, "He shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I cone and smite the earth with a curse" (Mal. 4:6). This reference to "turning the heart" suggests much more than just raising good, obedient children who don't talk back or do drugs. That's relatively easy. Good Christian communities (a minority) are full of decent kids, and those millions of evangelicals who haven't arrived at that level yet need to stop there first. Spanking mechanics and parental authority are "first principles" that we should have learned long ago (Heb. 5: 12).

But we should want much more than just decent children. Rather than failing at basic discipline, I'm much more worried about raising decent but soulless children, children with that blank, unconscious stare who run in tight grooves, completely lacking in any passion for anything grand and beautiful. It seems that decent but soulless children and their parents would be those to whom much was given and much was buried.

"Soul" is one of those real but intangible characteristics that we can easily point to, though it won't squeeze through a scientific screen. The more biblical synonym for this sense of soul is "wisdom," and we can say that a soulful person is one who is consciously aiming to absorb the truths of the books of Proverbs, Psalms, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Solomon. None of us is there yet, since it's a lifetime pursuit. But some ignore the path entirely, and others look at it disdainfully. And those are the people who will have to give an account for their soulless kids.

But here again, we are too comfortable with the biblical word "wisdom." We hear it, think we grasp it, and run down the line. We think the message of wisdom in Proverbs is just "no debt, no gossip, no proud looks." But Pharisees can do those things. Wisdom or having soul involves so much more. It is an active, conscious pursuit (Prov. 2:2) that creates a "fountain of life" (Prov. 13:14) and a "tree of life" (Prov. 3:18) and "life unto thy soul" (Prov. 3:22). It creates a life that aims to gush with joy and blossom with creativity. It eats its bread with joy and drinks its wine with a merry heart; for God has accepted its works (Eccl. 9:7).

But it is even more than that. Wisdom involves wonder, a mysterious, humble wonder-a taste for beauty: "There be three

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