Photo by Matt Collamer on Unsplash

I talk to strangers, and so do my children. I know parents are supposed to teach their children just the opposite, but the truth is, my children are the ones who taught me to talk to strangers. That’s right. Rather than me breaking them of the habit, my boys taught me to slow down, to notice those around me, and to talk to strangers. They were the catalyst God used to teach me to see people the way Christ sees them and to love people with the love discovered in knowing Jesus Christ. 

Before becoming a mom, I didn’t talk to strangers. I didn’t really make eye contact with people when out running errands. Get in and get out. I had things to do. But when life changed and I had young children, I didn’t get in and out of anywhere fast. I was forced to walk slowly, look at things and people my preschoolers wanted to show me. I learned to have conversations with all kinds of people and spent plenty of time making apologies for things said by my child like, “You’re old.  Are you going to die soon?” 

The rich act of noticing people, and well, talking to strangers, played out one rainy afternoon as I followed my five year old’s lead and joined a homeless man for lunch at Jack In The Box. After we ordered our food and sat down, H noticed a dingy looking man and said, “That man doesn’t have any food and he looks sad.” I told him the man may still be waiting for his order, but agreed he did look sad. Ten minutes later H brought it to my attention again—still no food (and we had ours), so H decided to go check on him. I told H that if the man didn’t have food coming, we could offer to buy his lunch. I watched H comfortably chat with the young man, who awkwardly looked around to see if there was an adult attached to this kid chatting it up with a stranger. I waved, walked over, and explained that H had noticed him and was concerned he didn’t have lunch. He said he was fine with his warm cup of coffee. I added that H thought he looked sad. The man replied, “Well, I am sad.” As H joined him in his booth, I smiled awkwardly and asked if he would mind us joining him for lunch, and he happily cleared the opposite side of the table. I grabbed our food and spent the next 30 minutes hearing about the man’s life, family, and what brought him to our town, with H interjecting his own questions and encouragements. I spoke to him about the hope found in a relationship with the God who created him and loves him. We then prayed with him, gave him some money and contact information where he could find more help, and we went our way. 

There are many other lessons my sons have walked me through on how to be a more Christ-like human being—“Self-denial to keep others alive”, “Slowing Down: slowing down in order to lead others in a way they can follow, slowing down to notice beauty around me, and slowing down to notice the ugly and painful around me”, and “The Discipline of the Monotonous and Boring” to name a few. I’ve had to re-take several of their courses, but slowly, I am learning to love God and love others the way I love myself.

Let me encourage you to let your children be a catalyst God uses to bring about change in you. Your children are amazing. They are gifts. They are unexpected teachers. Sometimes they mimic our bad habits, behavior, and attitudes. And when they do, we should take notice, learn, and change. Sometimes they respond to others with innocence of heart and sacrificial love, while we breeze past with calloused hearts and cluttered mind—we should slow down, see, hear, and care.

I talk to strangers now. Imperfect as I am, I am trying to do better at responding as Christ would.

Scriptures that have shaped my thoughts on this topic:

Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward. (Psalm 127:3)

But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him? Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth. (1 John 3:17-18)

One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?”

“The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:28-31)

For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life. (John 3:16)

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. ) Genesis 1:26-27)

Don’t let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith and in purity. (1 Timothy 4:12)