Running Wild

G. K. Chesterton: “The chief aim of the Christian order is to give room for all good things to run wild.”

 

I ran across this on a homeschooling blog this morning. It resonated immediately. Giving order to chaos so that growth can appear….pruning roses enough that they will bloom and bloom! What a fantastic picture!

Reading another blog I was reminded how easy it is to let the desire for order overwhelm the purpose of order. Yes, children make messes and yes, they waste things, and yes, we need to instruct them in these areas. But it shouldn’t be all instruction, all the time.

We need to allow them to be children and to explore and to find out what they are good at. what they are interested in and who they have been created to be. Uniquely. Differently from each other and differently from us.

I really struggle with that sometimes. Especially with Su, who is like me in many ways and unlike in ways that I see as weaknesses- but that maybe are areas that I need to give some time to. It’s one of the reasons why I am so pleased that F is going to Junior Kindergarten in a few weeks. He’ll be gone five mornings a week and I’m hoping, praying and working toward using a good bit of that time to get to know and understand my daughter. We’ll do school together of course, but I also want to just watch her while she interacts with her baby brother, plays by herself and steps into some of her big brother’s responsibilities as the eldest child at home.

I think this is going to be a real year of growth for all of us and I want to create an atmosphere of order here that does indeed allow “room for all good things to run wild.”

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