The Spirit of The Home... The Spirit of a Nation...

My oldest came home from school today and told me that one of his closest friends was beaten up by a gang of thugs...thankfully, he was being watched over (from above...certainly not by any authority at school) and after he was knocked out, they didn't continue. It could have been so much worse...

There are regular fights at school, but they've never bothered me that much because it's usually the gangs beating each other up or some dispute that's gotten out of control. Maybe I should be more concerned, but if they want to beat each other up...so be it. Yea, I may have a heart issue on this one.

But today was different... Zack's friend was simply walking to class with another friend. Someone asked them for a cigarette and when they didn't have one, they first attacked one boy and then Zack's friend.

This comes on the heels of a proposal by our county's school superintendant to cut security in our schools by $2,000,000! Has he lost his mind?

I am so angry that I can't send my child to school and feel certain that he will be safe... When Zack found out where all of this occurred, he said, "Oh, the gangs hang out there all the time." He also told me that during last semester, when he had a class in this area that they used to watch the fights from the classroom windows and his teacher, on a fairly regular basis, had to go and break up these fights.

The school knows about this area...they know it's a problem...but it's not lighted...so during daylight savings time, it's pitch black and while there's usually a security officer who patrols the area, he had gone for training today and no one had bothered to replace him.

We're talking to Zack about some safety measures, but I'm not naive, I realize there are no guarantees...these kids have no respect for life.

But how could they? We live in a society where life, at it's most basic, innocent stage means nothing...it is viewed as disposable matter by far too many. And I believe with all of my heart, it's affecting our children. My cousin sent me this quote a number of years ago and I go back to it time and time again...

"A child's character is forming under a principle, not of choice, but of nurture. The spirit of the house is breathed into his nature, day by day.

The anger and gentleness, the fretfulness – and patience – the appetites, passions, and manners – all the variant moods of feeling exhibited around him, pass into him as impressions, and become seeds of character in him; not because the parents will, but because it must be so, whether they will it or not.

They propagate their own evil in the child, not by design, but under a law of moral infection. The spirit of the house is in the members of the children by nurture, not by teaching, not by any attempt to communicate the same, but because it is the air the children breathe. Understand that it is the family, the organic life of the house, the silent power of domestic godliness, working as it does, unconsciously and with sovereign effect – this it is which forms your children to God."

I have been a parent for 15 years now and I know that what is written above is truth... does our teaching impact them at all? Sure, but only if it is followed up by the way we live. AND, if the way we live is real and sincere...not a mask we wear for the world. Our children know the difference, even if we think they don't.

But in this day and time, it's not just the air, the spirit of the home that infects them...it's the culture around them.

I don't know what has happened that has brought about the evil in the kids at school, but I am quite certain that it began in the home, and it had a ripe environment in the rest of the world in which to grow...

On the news, over the last couple of days, there has been a report about how more and more people are turning from their faith... We think we can remove God from our society and still be ok... NOT! We are reaping what we have sown for years and years. It began in the spirit of the person...it infected the spirit of the home and over time...it infected the spirit of a nation.

Our seemingly insignificant choices, that we think only impact us, are impacting generation after generation... As much as we like to believe that we can behave like we live in a vacuum...that our individual choices only impact us...that we each have a right to do what feels good to us...it's just not so...our actions, our choices, our attitudes affect everyone around us.

In faith, with a little bit of fear, I will send my child to school tomorrow... I believe with all of my heart that that is where he is supposed to be...we're called to be a light and Zack is a bright light. But starting now, I will pray harder that God will have mercy on our nation and begin the process of drawing hearts back to Him...only then will things begin to change.