Affection: Let’s Say It! Let’s live it!” Let’s Give it!”
Did you grow up in a home where love was often expressed verbally? What about physical expressions of love and care? Did you receive hugs and kisses? Did you observe tender hugs and kisses between the parents or grandparents? You may wonder why I am asking these personal question. Neither my nor my wife’s parents were verbally or physically expressive to us with loving words or tender actions. Both of us decided early in our relationship to do better and share loving words and tender touch with our kids.
One fond memory I have was of my dad rocking me to sleep one night when I was a good-sized lap-full (I was 6 or 7 years old). I wasn’t feeling well. Apparently he could sense I needed him near me. We sat in a small, yellow vinyl-covered rocking chair in front of a gas heater. This didn’t happen often, but it was special when it did. My Dad was fun sometimes too. He was a kidder. He also wrestled with us boys. That was fun.
I sometimes wonder whether anyone ever told my father that he was loved, wanted, special, or important. He was, you know. He was special to God and to our family – 8 kids and a wife. The problem is that we didn’t say it or take much time to show it.
I have coined a phrase that I use often: “If you love someone you ought to find out how to make sure they know it.” Let’s not leave it to chance. Let’s intentionally love. It is commanded. Remember? The greatest commandment is to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength”. Then the second commandment is like it: “And you will love your neighbor as yourself.”
What do I wish my folks had done better or more of? That question was asked of me years ago in some marriage training. My answer was simple.
Answer: “I wish they had told me how important I was to them, how much they loved me, how smart they thought I was, told me thank you when I tried to do something helpful, said “I’m sorry” when they wronged me or neglected me, said “you can do it, son”, “come here and let me do that with you until you learn to do it yourself”, said, “you are great, or I am so proud of you, good job.”
Because my Dad, I feel sure, never heard those words; consequently, neither did I. I don’t think my wife’s parents heard love deeply expressed either. So she didn’t hear much encouragement, support, respect, or comfort. When she and I married, we were blessed of God to learn Bible-centered relationship truths along the way.
I was slow to learn many of these life-altering truths, but God kept showing His love to me – Jesus’ sacrificial love, Holy Spirit’s unchanging, never ending river of living water. My mother once told me in her later years after my spouse and I had experienced a marriage revival that revolutionized our home, that she “wished she had done for us what she saw us do for our kids”.
What an important day that was for me. My Mom was a great woman of God and a prayer warrior, so when she made that statement I knew she meant it. We have tried to honor our parents by learning from the mistakes they made, discovering how to stop the cycles of dysfunction, and replace much pain of aloneness in our families with the intimacy of love God designed us to experience.
We don’t do it perfectly, but we continue to make progress even after 50 years of marriage. Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.