My husband is a pastor of a small church in a small rural town. My son, who was 15 at the time, has always been an impetuous, funny, impulsive fellow. His diagnosis is bipolar but I know that God has a plan for this creative, intelligent young man!
He is silly. He loves to joke around and tease people. He has a heart as big as Alaska and a sense of humor that keeps me in stitches constantly.
But he is also strong-willed and independent, and it does get him into trouble. However, this incident has really had an impact on him and helped him understand that there is a reason to obey your parents.
There is a young lady in our church who is the same age and has a terrible crush on our son. My son is not interested in her in that way. He is the kind of kid that is friends with everyone, and I think that because of that, this girl, who has never been given any attention by boys at public school, latched onto my son because of his gregarious, friendly manner.
After church they would sit in her mother's truck and listen to music in the parking lot of the church. We had told our son repeatedly to number one, stay away from this young lady and number two, not sit in the truck after church because we didn't feel it was appropriate. We knew it might give people the wrong impression and an excuse to stumble or gossip.
My son is naive and emotionally immature for his age, and he just didn't see the reason not to just sit in that truck and listen to good Christian music. The truck had a great stereo system. And besides, this girl was the only other person in the church his age.
One reason we had asked our son to stay away from this young lady was because she was constantly getting my son into trouble for things he would say in jest. Her father would call all upset because my son inadvertently hurt her feelings. Often, my son would deny that he had said the things she had accused him of, but we weren't there, so it was our son's word against this girl's. Besides, we knew he was quick-witted and silly, and it was quite possible.
Then, one day about five or six months ago we got a phone call that devastated us. This girl accused our son of making inappropriate advances toward her. These included touching her places that were not his to touch. I didn't know what to believe. Could my impetuous, impulsive son have done this? In my mother's heart of hearts, I really didn't think so. But then, he had disobeyed us and sat in the truck, hadn't he? Could it be true?
The family left our church over it. We asked the family to please not share this information with anyone and to keep it between us but it didn't happen. They went to the associate pastors of our church, who immediately turned against us. People started rumors. The girl had told the associate pastors our son was dating a witch! (He had a friendship with a young lady, who wasn't a Christian, but she wasn't a witch, and he only met her twice and it was in our company and the company of his married brother. He had invited this unchurched girl to a youth function.)
Our son went through basic torture through this because he not only got in big trouble from us, and was punished, but no one would believe him. I wanted to believe him, but because we had recently caught him lying to us, I didn't know what to believe. All I knew was that every time I brought it up and tried to trick him into a confession, he never changed his story.
Our son was truly repentant. But even so, his father, the pastor, asked him not to sing during worship on the platform. (He has a beautiful singing voice.) After his dad felt that he really was remorseful for this issue happening, and our son was being very obedient, he allowed him to join us back on the platform during worship in music. (His dad plays guitar, I play piano, and his brother plays the drums. We are a musical family.)
When our son joined us again, the associate pastor began to complain about it to other people. Of course, I found out "through the grapevine," and it really bothered me. You can criticize me all you want -- I can pretty much take that -- but criticizing my children hurts beyond words! (Believe me, this isn't the first time in ministry that our kids have been criticized!)
I kept my silence. What could I say or do? I had no way of knowing if this incident had really occurred or not. And I knew that anything I said would just look like a blind mother defending her guilty son. So I felt the best thing for me to do was to suffer in silence. It was very difficult.
But finally, two weeks ago, the girl's dad called to tell us that his daughter confessed to him that she had lied about the whole thing and made the whole thing up. So we met with her, forgave her, but let her know that what she did harmed us possibly irreparably. We asked her to call the associate pastor and his wife (they winter in Florida) and tell them the truth.
I asked the girl why she did this, and she said it was because she liked my son for a boyfriend, and she was jealous of his friendship with this other girl. That was very silly because we don't even encourage our children to "date." We believe in courtship.
Young men! Wake up! Obey your parents! Your parents really do know what is best for you. This would have never happened if my son had obeyed us and not sat in the truck with her in the parking lot. I know he thought it was harmless, that he was not acting inappropriately with her, and that he didn't think it mattered what other people thought. But he didn't understand the wisdom of his parents to avoid the appearance of evil and to not give foothold to the devil in any way!
As of this writing, the young lady has not yet called and told the associate pastor. Her mother called them and just said, "'I'm asking you to forgive me." She didn't tell them why. They didn't tell the associate's the whole truth. I know this because the associate's wife called me and I asked her.
There is still healing to be done. My son is learning some valuable lessons from this. He learned that God is his defense, that God will fight the battles for Him, and that to forgive is to be set free from bitterness. But he is also learning that his parents do know what's best for him. Because he is headstrong he had to learn it the hard way, and it caused his family a mountain of hurt.
I am relieved, however, that the girl came clean. I just pray that it can all be completely healed! But the fact remains, a young man's reputation, the most important thing he has, has been sullied by a jealous young girl.
I hope you will share this with your children. Daughters must learn not to treat the reputations of others casually. And sons must learn to avoid the appearance of evil and obey their parents. We all can learn a lesson from this, can't we??
We covet your prayers! Please pray the girl will come clean with the associate pastor and his wife so that they will believe us. Please pray people will repent and stop their gossiping. It's so much fun to attack the pastor's family, isn't it?
We have never claimed to be a perfect family. In fact, we expose our foibles so that people understand that we are just people learning to walk with the Lord as they are. We have not arrived! We're just doing the best we can by the grace of God.
Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended:
but this one thing I do,
forgetting those things which are behind,
and reaching forth unto those things which are before,
I press toward the mark for the prize
of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
Philippians 3:13 & 14
but this one thing I do,
forgetting those things which are behind,
and reaching forth unto those things which are before,
I press toward the mark for the prize
of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
Philippians 3:13 & 14
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