The Present Crisis

I once had someone suggest to me that our government should pay mothers to stay home and take care of their children. They would not have to leave the home in order to find work and earn enough to make ends meet. Research abounds to support the benefits of a mother who stays at home and is therefore typically the most constant and important influence in a child’s life. Her argument was that the government would actually save money because you could reduce the amount of money spent on all of the social ills of our culture including prisons, drugs, health issues, teenage/unwanted pregnancies etc. I am reminded of this conversation with my friend after recently reading a BRILLIANT, old poem by James Russell Lowell titled, The Present Crisis.

This was not an easy, breezy, lemon-squeezy type of poem. All ninety lines are dripping with meaning and feeling. There are words that I had to look up and references to ideas that needed to be learned. I took each stanza apart and tried to pull the meaning and the symbolism out. I took my time. I have worked on it off and on for about a week. I have my analysis finished and am now just re-listening to it and finding that I can’t believe how much this poem speaks to me! This poem is not dead! It is every bit as pertinent today as it was 179 years ago.`

I have always had a passion for liberty and the preservation of our freedoms. I get discouraged when I see the apathy of those around me. I get discouraged when I see people willing to trade their liberty for a little bit of security or comfort now. I also get discouraged when we don’t learn from the mistakes of the past. Old ideas are recycled with a fresh coat of paint and passed off as new. This poem doesn’t pull any punches. It blasts each and every one of these tendencies into oblivion. It puts the full responsibility of maintaining freedom and liberty on our shoulders—yours and mine.

So why do I find myself pondering on a conversation about someone offering to pay me for taking care of my own children?

Currently, the earth is aching for deeds of freedom to be done—all over the world, not just in the obvious places, but even here, in what was once known as the bastion of liberty, and is still considered so by most. The cyclical nature of the history of humans is well known. Name one civilization that doesn’t fall somewhere on this cycle of freedom. Name one culture/civilization that was not destroyed mostly because of the selfishness and complacency, which grew out of Abundance. Does anyone argue that the earth isn’t ripe for the pendulum of liberty to swing towards the dependency/bondage portion of the cycle. 

You can read a good article about this cycle here.

We depend on the government elite and the so-called experts sanctioned by the government elite to help us with almost every single facet of our lives. They effect our education, our healthcare, our businesses, homes, banking, our private property and natural resources. Their ever-so-helpful hands are into what we watch, what we eat, what we do in our spare time, who we support, who we disagree with and how we show that support. We have become so dependent on them that we cannot even call religion solely our own domain anymore.

Bondage is just around the next corner. We are already partially there. What the government pays for, the government controls. My sister-in-law and her husband are fostering two children. They have gone through the state to become certified in order to become trustworthy enough for the state to trust them with two beautiful children. The state will pay for the children’s basic needs however the state tells them how to discipline, how to feed them, what to feed them, how to organize their house, when to take them to the doctor, who can babysit for them and requires them to comply with the smallest of details even down to the year that the crib was made. Nothing is left to the common sense of the foster parents. ----they are in bondage--- All in the name of, “For the good of the children.”

This is why hearing my friend tell me that she thought it was a good idea for the government to pay me to be a mom actually made me physically sick. The thought of a government beaurocrat coming into my house and telling me how to take care of my children was abhorrent to me. I love my children more than my own life. I am the one who has the stewardship to receive inspiration for their benefit-not some do-gooder with a clipboard to check off the list of standards met or failed. They are unique and precious and individual—Just like yours! We will each have to answer to God for our decisions, choices and relationships regarding our children. We do not need a government expert who isn’t even allowed to believe in that God telling us what to do.

My point is this: Our freedoms are slipping from our fingers through not only the outright, blatant, destruction which comes from power-hungry elites but also from the seemingly good intentions of our friends and our neighbors. Every time we yield our own responsibility towards our own life or our children's lives, we become more and more dependent upon a beneficent government to make those decisions for us.  Regardless of where the danger comes from though, it is our duty, according to Lowell, We ourselves must Pilgrims be, launching our Mayflower and steering BOLDLY through the desperate winter sea.

The future lies with us! We have to keep going. We have to keep moving forward—to continually be doing right, advocating for right. We absolutely CANNOT simply rely on the freedom that our ancestors have won and continue thinking that all is well. Slavery, in whatever form it takes is a heinous, wretched result of allowing ourselves to become dependent on our benefactors for a life of ease and luxury. In reality, those taskmasters, says Lowell, are still groping, waiting for their miserable prey. By doing nothing to stop them now, we are in actuality guiding their gory fingers to where our helpless children play. Siding with truth is not always popular or financially advisable, but it is the coward who waits to do anything until it is fashionable or profitable. The brave man refuses to make compromise with sin.

Thoughts inspired by Pride and Prejudice

Thoughts inspired by contemplating this question while reading Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austin.

Is there anything in my life that I am doing to impress others more than a desire to be true to God?

I know that in my homeschooling I am still very sensitive to the outward appearance of learning and reaching certain benchmarks according to the public perception of when something should be learned. My reasons for this are not all purely selfish or vain. Part of me is just so sensitive to the home vs public school debate that I don’t want to give anyone a reason to badmouth homeschooling. I want to prove, through the success of my children, to everyone that homeschooling is an especially effective, and successful option. My mistake is made when I imply that “success” has to be immediate and constant—and not just in the end result.

I cannot explain to all of the people within my sphere of influence that I have a tried and true process and that my timeline is not the same as theirs. I can’t tell them that inspiration is fundamental to how and when I teach certain things. I don’t have time to explain that if my children learn according to their wants/needs then the lesson learned will be so much more effective when it is finally learned.  I just simply don’t have time to go into depth about all the theories behind my homeschooling choices. Nor do they want me to.

Most people don’t really want to know why I do the things I do. They don’t want to listen to my opinions. They simply want to make sure that their child is doing okay-that their child is ahead of the game. They want to be able to compare and feel justified in their own choices.

So why do I worry about what they think of me or of my desire to homeschool or their opinion of my child’s intelligence? Why do I hamper my children with conveyor-belt style educational leftovers from public school? I yell, urge, twist, manipulate and am constantly frustrated by the tail-chasing that I do.

If I was true to principles given by God however, I would eventually have not only a wonderfully educated, loving, righteous, brilliant child who grows up to fulfill their own individual mission here upon this earth but also the respect of any friends or colleagues who’s opinions and regard are worth having.

God’s way is NEVER manipulative! He never twists things to His advantage. He does urge, but rarely, if ever, yells. His way is completely based on principle. He does not cater to the public whim. He does not fluctuate with every new fad or theory. He created the heavens. He organized the earth. He is the alpha and the omega. He knows what he is doing. Why would I care more about the opinions of my neighbor than I care about the inspiration from the Lord of Lords? His definition of success might be different from that of my neighbor, but whose idea of success would you rather reach? Would you rather hear, “hey, nice job! Your son made it into Harvard and was voted most likely to succeed class of 2015.” Or, “Well done, good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord.”