How We Change the World

This was the brief conversation between me and a young boy I had the privilege of meeting while serving in a squirrel costume at a week-long kid’s camp. We were singing of changing the world. This five-year-old was dreaming of changing his home. Somebody drop a mic or something! That is amazing!

I am convinced it is wisdom our nation and generation desperately need.

It is powerfully counter to the standard culture of advancement in which we live. From the earliest years, we begin asking kids what they are going to be or do when they grow up. When we meet strangers we ask the same, silently jockeying for position on the hierarchy of occupational influence.

What if instead we asked young kids what their dreams for their families are, what kind of legacy they want to leave for their children?
What if we ask the adults we met how they are changing their homes rather than how they are advancing their career interests?

The reality is millions of people in our society are running around busily leading people in their workplaces, trying in their own way to change the world, all the while neglecting to properly prioritize and lead those few they’ve been given at home.

The Bible illustrates this concept so well. In the early chapters of the Old Testament, men like Abraham and Moses are called for their faithfulness and excellence outside the home, and because of that greatness called “Fathers” in the patriarchal sense. This pattern switches at the beginning of the New Testament though, Paul says that only those who have their homes well cared for have any business leading outside of it in the church.

In the new reality, excellent parenthood qualifies you for influence and leadership in the wider world, not the other way around.

My five-year-old friend, with his simple phrase, knocks down all our fragile towers of adult grandstanding. There is nothing more important than the health of our homes. I am convinced the world flows from families. As the health of the family goes, so goes the health of the world.

If we want to change the world, we must listen to our miniature prophets and change our homes.

The challenge for all of us is that we want to be seen. Like the little kid who screams, “look at me!” our heart longs to be noticed, valued, celebrated. We live in a culture that saves those accolades and noticing for men and women “making a difference” and are “getting busy changing the wider world.” We live in a world where parenting is categorized as the common-place side duty, not the primary call on a person’s life worthy of all the celebration. You aren’t likely to get a ton of acknowledgement for making an intentional shift to change your home. Not from the outside anyway. Those accolades will come however. When our kids look back upon their childhood at the faithful parents who prioritized changing their homes then there will be acknowledgement. When our present five-year-olds look into our eyes and speak wisdom, or tell us their love, and we are present enough to hear it, in their words and affection are accolades greater than any award, promotion or gentlemanly golf-clap. And finally, when we stand before our Maker and hear “well done, good and faithful servant” there will be the greatest accolades of all. In that day may we all hear as well, “You were faithful in the little and I gave you much. You changed your home and together we changed the world!”