Who's In Your Home? You won't see them!

Who is in your home?  You won’t see them!

A mother was having a great deal of difficulty with a daughter who was in college.  The daughter was failing in school and decided to come home for the weekend just to spend some time at home.  The family was relieved and planned all kinds of activities to make the daughter feel welcome and yet be reminded of the values of the home.

As the family all gathered together for a meal with other brothers and sisters and families invited, they noticed a sudden shift in attitude with the daughter home from college.  Where she was laughing and enjoying herself the half hour before, now she was depressed, giving short answers and the whole room was being affected.  The dinner atmosphere had gone from a family get together to a tense worried atmosphere.  Why?  Than the mother realized, there was someone else in the home that was un-seen but still creating nothing but pain in their home.  There were texts going back and forth throughout the whole morning, but not really being noticed by everyone because texting goes on all the time, it seemed with everyone.

Who was that person who had entered their home?  Well, it was actually several she found out.  One was the boyfriend that their daughter was trying to break up with; the other was some friends who wanted her to meet them and go out and party.  This was the world their daughter was joining and one of the reasons her grades were failing.   This world had followed that daughter right into her parent’s homes and was having impact even though this world was invisible to the rest of the family.

How often does that happen?  Who is in our house late at night?  We need to have “shut down” times in our homes.  While children are in our home, that is possible.  I know parents who have a rule that all phones are in a basket by a certain time in the evening.  Phones don’t go into the bedrooms.  I know other parents who check their children’s phones, messages, etc.  As parents we would check and monitor their computer activity or at least we should; why not our phones?

One parent was angry because her daughter was receiving texts from a student at her school at 4:00 am and wanted the school to do something about it.  The Principal told the parent, to remove the phone from their daughter and shut it off and that would end the problem.  The parent was furious and said it wasn’t their responsibility to stop this.  It was and is their responsibility.  Yes, it would be nice if the other parents of the kid calling would realize what was going on, and perhaps her parent’s could find a way to let them know, but the school is not the parents of our children. You don’t want schools to become your children’s parents!

Again, each family has to be creative in their own ways to handle these problems, but one thing is for sure.  We do have influences in our homes like never before.  What is wonderful on one side is frightening on the other side.  Perhaps it is a good thing to have “No texting or phones during dinner” or after a certain time in the evening.

Adults can be just as bad.  We went to eat at the Red Lobster one evening and watched an entire table of young adults and older adults all texting.  Very little conversation took place, but a lot of communication was going on with the “un-seen”.  It isn’t all bad, but we aren’t really with each other.  There is something precious being lost in our day and age.

Technology is wonderful for sure.  It has its hazards and we need to be watchful both with ourselves and with our families.  Talk about it together as a family and come up with some boundaries after discussing not only the hazards but also the need to have “quiet times”.  There is a point where even our God has told us “Be still, and know that I am God.”   We all have to have those times just to get to know God, which of course helps us in all areas of our lives.