Accidental Goodness and the Reality of Safety

For the past several months, I accidentally found myself doing a little experiment with my kids. If you don't know, I have quite a wide range of ages and personalities in my household. I have all boys: a high school freshman, a very curious 5th grader, and a 3rd grader who loves to ask questions.

For a long time, my more conservative religious background and education taught me to protect the innocent ears of my children. Even the Christian radio channel that we had playing in our home and car said it was "safe for the whole family." In our day and age, "safe" seems to be a term that is becoming more and more relative. Some pastor at some point (even I have used it) has referenced in a sermon the illustration from The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe that Aslan isn't safe, but he is good. 

About two months ago, I changed our radio in our home and car to public radio. I didn't say anything about the change. I did it because I personally wanted to be more aware of what was going on in our world. Not thinking it would have such an effect on my children and the conversations at breakfast and in the car on the way to school. Boy was I wrong.

For our family, Christian radio had become more like a filter for the reality and normalcy of life. It filtered out much of the world and its issues, which as Christians, we desperately need to be aware. I also noticed it lacked a variety of artistic expression and views that would make us ask better questions or questions at all.  It was safe, but was it good?

Then something began to happen. My boys began having conversations on their own about what they were listening to on public radio. One morning, I came down to make breakfast after my wife left for work and the boys were talking about presidential elections and history. Another day, I found them talking about Pablo Picasso and artistic expression. Another day, they asked me questions about other religions and why we believe different things.

The arguing about breakfast choices and brother issues began to lessen. Instead we found ourselves engaged in current topics, international issues (my middle son even looked up on a map where a county could be found), we talked about difficult issues...but the amazing thing was that we were TALKING.

Growing up my father always received the daily newspaper. I enjoyed crawling up on his lap as he read it. Until just recently, I too, received the newspaper. I believe it was because someone once said, children with houses that receive the newspaper have higher IQ scores. Maybe in our changing world, public radio is the replacement for the newspaper. Don't get me wrong, I still enjoy reading a real newspaper and having to wash my hands after doing so because of the ink left on my hands.

I know some of you have already wrote me off for saying something about public radio. Some would say it isn't appropriate for my children. Some are simply judging me. Yet, what I have found is my kids have begun to listen more, become more aware, to know more about the world they live in.
  

We went from "safe noise" to interacting with the "greater good."

This past week at church, we prayed through the international headlines for the weekend. This morning as we were heading to school, Myanmar was being discussed.  Immediately, the boys all stopped what they were talking about and said, "Listen, they are talking about Myanmar." We listened to the news and for a moment I realized that my boys had just connected to the Kingdom of God and the greater Good! 

Bob Henry, January 2013