Listening Isn't for Wimps
Theme of the Week: Really Listen to Your Children
Monday, July 6, 2009
 1 of 1
Key Bible Verse: "If only someone would listen to me!" (Job 31:35). Bonus Reading: Malachi 4:5-6a
Well," Edward answered, "I keep hanging up my fly rod in the trees and you yell at me. I slip and fall in the stream and you yell at me for spooking the fish. It's just no fun, Dad!"
"So what do you want to do?" I asked.
"Go mountain biking on the top of Mammoth Mountain," he said. "Let's take the gondola to the top and ride down."
I concealed my terror as we took our bikes to the summit. "Follow me, Dad," Edward said as he started the Kamikaze Run. Applying maximum brake pressure to slow my 325-pound frame as we sped downward, the slowest I could go was 35 miles an hour!
To maneuver the decomposed granite of the switchback turns, the idea is to sit back on your bike so your front wheel doesn't dig into the soft slope. Three times my front wheel dug in, launching me end-over-end. "Are you okay, Dad?" Edward asked, looking at me sprawled on my back, toe clips still attached. "I've never seen anyone do that before."
Maybe your vacations are about polishing your Harley, doing what only you want to do. This might be a good time to lean down and say, "Hey, son, what do you want to do?"
—Ed McGlasson in The Difference a Father Makes
My Response: Do my children sense that I hear what they are feeling? What makes me think so?
Adapted from The Difference a Father Makes (Ampelon Publishers, 2004) by permission.
Copyright © 2009 by the author or Christianity Today International/Men of Integrity magazine.
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Lord, help me learn ways to interact with my children that go beyond surface conformity to heart motivation.
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