• Apologetics
  
• Arts Ministry
  
• Children's Ministry
  
• Evangelism
  
• Pastors
  
• Worship
  

Kindness Lasts a Long Time
by Norman Bales
All About Families

Twelve-year-old boys often struggle to understand themselves. Some of them take an enormous growth spurt. Others are self-conscious because they are still wearing child size jeans, while their friends are putting on men's sizes. They worry about acne, voice changes and when they'll start shaving. Suddenly, they're concerned about the way they look. They spend so much time looking in the mirror that parents contemplate limiting bathroom time. They're paying attention to girls even though it's not socially acceptable to admit it. They're caught between childhood and adulthood. They are silly one day and can reason with an adult the next. They may be developing spiritual sensitivity, but they don't want their friends to know they're reading the Bible and paying attention to sermons.

One young man went through all this but found himself thrust into additional confusion when his mother went away for a long hospital confinement as the result of mental illness. The stress of trying to figure out how to cope with the business of growing up was enough, but wondering about a mentally ill mother made the task a bit tougher. He had never heard the word schizophrenia and certainly had no idea what caused it, although from time to time he wondered if his own mischievous conduct brought it on.

One day the preacher said he thought it would be a good idea if the boy started going to Sunday School. He had attended assembly times with his parents, but Sunday School was for sissies. Nevertheless, he decided to give it a shot. Two things happened in Sunday School. (1) He got acquainted with a couple of boys, who have since become lifelong friends. (2) The Sunday School teacher displayed extraordinary kindness. She knew about his mother's hospitalization and the boy became her project.

She didn't use visual aids. She didn't use any of the modern day educational techniques. Class was really kind of boring. She taught out of "lesson quarterlies" written by people who had long forgotten what it was like to be a boy in the seventh grade. But something happened in that class. The boy still remembers that she taught him about Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. She helped him appreciate the reigns of Saul, David and Solomon. He learned that it's not always a good idea to listen to inexperienced advisors when she took him through the breakup of the nation of Israel and commented on Reheboam's lack of common sense. He should have known better than listen to the inexperienced young rabble-rousers he chose for advisors. She helped him sort out the tangled affairs of the divided kingdom. He even went home and read the Bible during the week. He actually read the quarterlies, boring as they were.

The key was not her teaching style; it was her kindness. With her life, she verified the practicality of Paul's words in Ephesians 4:32 - "Be kind and compassionate to one another . . . ." The boy arrived early for class and so did the teacher. They chatted about the happenings in his life. Once he was invited to her home. Her husband was a cattle rancher. They lived in a house that seemed elegant to the boy. She demonstrated gentleness, thoughtfulness and compassion on a level the young man had rarely ever seen.

A few months later, the lady's husband began ranching operations in another part of the country. They moved away to begin a new life somewhere else. The young boy grew physically, emotionally and spiritually. After his high school graduation he went to college, graduated and then went on to graduate school. He entered the ministry, married and raised a family, but he never forgot the lady who managed to convince an indifferent young man that he could learn some exciting things from the Old Testament. The next time he saw his teacher, the boy was almost forty years old and the teacher was nearing eighty. Neither of them had forgotten the incredible moment in time when their paths had crossed many years before. She has since gone on to her reward, but I think of her often and I'm extremely grateful to have been the one who was blessed by her kindness.

All of us have daily opportunities to show kindness. Husbands and wives need to shower each other with acts of kindness. Parents and children could greatly improve their communication if they would "try a little kindness." In so doing, we reflect the very nature of God. Jesus said that God is even " . . .kind to the ungrateful and wicked" (Luke 6:35). Many of us are caught up in the competition to accumulate things. According to the Bible, things perish with the using. The effects of kindness lasts a long time - more than fifty years in the experience I've described.