A Story to Tell

In a moment of pure brilliance as parents, we thought it was important for our children to learn service. As part of one of our monthly FHE themes we decided that "work" for the month of February would be followed by "service" in March. Clark and I have been patting ourselves on the back for our wonderfully thought out plan and our amazing ability to be pro-active parents. (Our catch phrase, by the way.)

In reality, I was cornered in the kitchen grumpily making Sunday evening dinner. I really was not in the mood for discussing anything. Or thinking for that matter. I was sticking hard with the idea of Sunday being a day of rest so therefore, it shouldn't include planning out the next year's worth of FHEs. Clark persisted however and we managed to come up with these monthly themes. We struck gold with these ideas.

Anyway, I'm going somewhere with this. This month was on service. And what better way to teach service to children than to do service. This led to some rather awkward conversations with people we know.

"Hi, we are trying to teach our children service. Could we come pull weeds at your house? Or come clean your windows?" Or . . . you get my point.

We've taken our kids on a couple of these little service visits. They've done a small share of work and help for others. They've been rewarded with rootbeer and cookies and unlimited amounts of time to run up and down and around and scream.

What I have found fascinating about these visits had nothing to do with what work we did but the conversations we had. It was this reminder that everyone has a story. One woman shared beautiful stories of her husband whom I didn't know. She was keeping him alive through her telling. Another woman shared of her struggles with her children and her life. She is an example of faith and perseverance.

Really, the service wasn't about a couple clean windows or a few pulled weeds. It was about listening and hearing. My kids really missed out on the true blessing of service - only because they are too young to know and understand - it's about recognizing in another person what life is and if we stop and listen, everyone has as story to tell.