A few years ago, longer than I’d like to admit, I was a young, 23 year old mother of one in Savannah, GA, desperately looking for a church. We’d visited a church for 8 months, and though my husband was serving in the youth ministry, neither of us were led to join. Doing what many young people do, we looked for a church that was cool among people of our age. We found a church that was large, in the thousands, and visited. After a few weeks, we were so excited by the music, the events and the vibe, that we’d decided that we’d found our church. Of course, we prayed for discernment, but I believe that was an afterthought for us. We’d already chosen our church.
Before we signed on the dotted line, I wanted to read all the policies and procedures of the children’s ministry. Again, this was a decision I made as a parent, not necessarily as a christian. I wanted the best for my child, and at that time, for me, the best meant fun, love, games and awesomeness. Little did I know that I was going to change my mind after reading that seemingly innocuous document.
Within the several pages long printout, I found a reference to ‘Growing Kids Gods Way’ or GKGW for short. For those of you unfamiliar, this is a christian curriculum created by Gary and Ann Marie Ezzo, the authors of the celebrated secular book, Babywise. I was a stay at home mom at this time, and with only one little one, under 6 mos, I had a great deal of time on my hands. I was volunteering at WIC (Women In Children, the government-sponsored program, a part of the Department of Agriculture, that gives out cheese, peanut butter, milk and cereal to impoverished women) as a breastfeeding counselor. I mentioned this program to my WIC sponsor and she let me know quickly that WIC abhorred this ‘movement’. As I sat in her office, she told me of children who had been hospitalized due to dehydration that she directly attributed that to this practice. As I looked closer at the materials, I saw that GKGW had their mothers adhere to a strict feeding schedule from birth, even breastfeeding mothers… In other words, with a feeding practice that relied on feeding children ‘on demand’, GKGW was encouraging mothers to absolutely refuse to feed hungry children.
In case you are unaware, all babies go through growth spurts at 3, 6, and 9 weeks and again at 3, 6 and 9 months. This is one of the tidbits I learned from the years at WIC and the years at La Leche League. If a breastfed child is not allowed to eat at these times, according to his/her desires, the mother will not make enough milk. Women make milk in response to demand, and if the baby is unable to show demand, through nursing at will, the mother will never make enough milk. We saw dozens of women ‘dry up’ due to the practice of scheduled feedings at WIC, and that was in less than a year in a small town!
Now, I will admit to being a breastfeeding Nazi. It took me 4 straight weeks of trying to get it right, so I was just about as determined/stubborn as you could possibly be. If you search for the term, breastfeeding Nazi, and my name, you’ll see someone graciously added me to a list on the web of breastfeeding Nazis. I’ve participated in sit-ins, breastfeeding in public places, and challenged every law that in any way encroaches on a woman’s right to feed her child (thank you to La Leche Leage for the amazing empowerment!), so I know I’m biased and I’m stating that fact very clearly. I believe that God gave us an amazing way to bond and nourish our children, and if at all possible, I hope everyone gives it a try. Of course, I know there are some darn good reasons for not breastfeeding, and please don’t think I’ll ever judge you for making a decision (just don’t judge me for making the decision I did). Hopefully this won’t turn into a breast vs. bottle debate. Some people choose not to, some people try their darndest and can’t, and some people are lucky enough to get to enjoy this sweet experience. None of this makes us, in any way, better mothers, more loved by our children, nor do we have smarter kids. I think that’s all bunk! Let’s just say we all have our own ways of feeding and loving our kids, and I’ve loved the heck out of my nephew feeding him a bottle by the way, so let’s all just get along… and I think that’s enough said about that.
Anyway, back to the story. When I learned about this ’scheduled feeding’ mess, I was angry, but I knew the right course of action was to make an appointment with the Pastor and tell him what I knew. In my young, naive brain, I thought he would welcome my insight and immediately pull this disastrous curriculum immediately. Now, I admit, I really set myself up for defeat.
My husband and I met with him, and while he listened, you could quickly tell he was bored to tears and a bit annoyed with this interruption from his studies. Within minutes he interrupted us, me actually, and said that his children survived the curriculum and I shouldn’t worry my pretty little head about it. We excused ourselves, defeated, and decided that obviously we were too weird to fit in at a normal church. We literally walked out with our heads down and tears welling in our eyes. Weeks went by, sad, and broken. It’s disheartening to know that you are alone in the world, and after that conversation I surely felt that way. Was I some hippie that just couldn’t fit in? Was I wrong? Did children really need to be denied food because it was sinful of them to intrude upon our time (directly from the Ezzos, by the way)? Was God ‘ignoring’ Jesus on the cross when he said ‘My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?” (again, directly from Growing Kids Gods Way)? Was I completely off base?
Weeks later, as I was listening to talk radio (yes I admit to a serious addiction to talk radio), there was commercial for a local church that was just starting. The Pastor was a man with a very, very southern drawl (and for those of you who’ve heard me talk, you know that if I say someone sounds ’southern’, then they darn well sound southern!), and talked about his church with a passion for the Word and a commitment to truth. Not wanting to waste even a minute getting my heart broken again, I called the church office after the commercial. I was immediately put through to the Pastor, who was more than willing to speak with a mere woman, and he encouraged us to visit. I told him our our recent dilemma and he said, “Well, I don’t know much about that curriculum”, with a slow voice, “but I can’t imagine that I’d allow something like that to be taught at our church.” He cared enough to listen, even to me, and after I got off the phone with him, I immediately called my husband at work to tell him I’d found a church for us.
We visited for a few weeks, and though this was a young church, meeting at a school, we knew quickly that this was the church that God had been saving us for. After 2 weeks, we had to be out for a season, because my 8 month old daughter had Salmonella and was hospitalized for over a week (another story, don’t get me started), but as soon as we were able to come back again, we gratefully joined the church. In fact, my daughter sat in service with us, and I was nursing her under a blanket when we were asked to come forward to join. We walked up, daughter still nursing under said blanket, and greeted everyone in front of the church after professing our desire to be a part of the body. Of course, I did have one older gentleman peek to see the baby and then turn away completely scarlet, LOL, but we were absolutely welcomed with open arms into that church. I ended up serving in the children’s ministry, first as a PreK teacher, and later as the Director of PreK, and we stayed at that church until God called us to pastor a church a few hundred miles away, in Brunswick, GA. Since then I’ve been the Director of Children’s Ministry or the Directory of PreK at every church I’ve been honored to be called to. Of course, since my husband is now a Pastor, I go where we’re called, and that instance in Savannah was the last time I’ve been privileged enough to ‘choose a church’, but at each church we’ve served at, I’m content in the Lord. From GA, to VA, to CA, we’ve been lots of places, but where God calls, we go.
That church wasn’t perfect, there was a time when I was called in by the same pastor to be told that nursing, even under a blanket, was making others uncomfortable, and would I like to use the bathroom to nurse? You can imagine my angry, self-righteous response (would you eat your lunch in a bathroom?-ick), but even through all that, I knew I was in a church that loved me, my family and the Lord. Through everything, that church smothered us with love and I credit that Pastor and his flock with leading me to a full and real relationship with the Lord. Jesus became real to me there, he wasn’t just a kind man, but was the son of the Almighty Lord, and even in times of strife within that church, most of us absolutely loved the Lord and that’s enough for me.
So yes, children’s ministry changed my life. Not in the normal way, but it changed it, and I’m a better person because of it.
