Alpha Encounter
5. Respect
Going beyond 'showing' respect, to living respect
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- Broadcast on:
- 23 Sep 2024
- Audio Format:
- other
(upbeat music) Hello, welcome to Alpha Encounter with me, Mike and my friend Jess in a bit. Today we're looking at how children can encounter God through the theme of respect. I really enjoyed this conversation. Bottom line, I think it's about grasping an idea that everybody is made with dignity. There's a Christian idea that we are all made in the image of God. And the Christian idea that all creation is a delight to God. So treating people and things with respect is recognizing that you're encountering an aspect of God with them right here, right now. And I love that reminder. We can meet God every time we meet someone. Plus, it encourages respect. So that can only be a good thing. So we're gonna refer to a picture that our friend Sarah Horn has drawn for us. And we're going to refer to the bible book of Esther. Esther is a long story. So we've written a shorter version for you. You can find that and Sarah's picture at www.spinnaker.org.uk, which is free to use for the price of your email. ♪ Are we just please city ♪ ♪ Find out what it means to me ♪ Respect. That is our theme today. Respect. How do we meet with God through respect? What even is respect? That's what we need to get to the bottom. What did you think respect meant? Well, this question, if I was asked to create a definition of respect, I would probably say it's to do with valuing other people and valuing their worth of everyone, regardless of what they do, that you show the respect and you value them. But when I looked it up, the dictionary definition is sort of stronger than that. It talks about sharing admiration, respecting them and not just on a kind of service level, but deeply admiring them. And I think that's a really interesting distinction. I took a really different angle to you. I was like, literally, how do we break this word down to respect? Look again. Like that. I think actually remains to go back, look back. But I like this idea that respecting is look again. We see someone, we're like, great, whatever, we move on. And actually, it's like, no, no, there's more to this person. Look back again, like, see the human inside. Yeah, seeking their value is already... And respect's quite a big deal in childhood. It is. One of my kind of pet peeves is that phrase. You need to earn my respect. And actually, the more we've talked about respect, the less I think that is true. I think respect is something you choose to give someone. Regardless of who they are and what they've done. Yeah, earning respect feels like the antithesis of respect is... I agree. Respect is about something like you give, naturally, first and foremost. And I think often we kind of combine respect with that idea of people who are older than you or wiser than you or have positions of authority. But actually, I would love for children to know that they can show respect to anybody. I feel like the table is a bit skewed. The scales are fixed. The pitch is one key, all those metaphors, with children. I feel sorry for them. Like, basically children are told they must respect their elders. They must respect such and such. And we don't really give children necessarily the same respect back. And I think kids are sort of vaguely aware that they grow up in a world that is unfairly biased against them on the respect levels. Absolutely. And I think one of the key things is stripping respect right back to its root. Why do we respect people? Actually, from a Christian perspective, we respect people because they're creations of God. And that the heart of it is we value who they are, that they are fearfully and wonderfully made in the image of God. And actually, then it doesn't matter what they do in their day-to-day lives. It doesn't matter how they behave, what they say, that we can choose to respect people because of their identity in court, not necessarily because of anything that they do to us or around us. Yeah. And that makes it, I find easier that I'm not having to find reasons to admire them, that I can just admire them, that in their essence, they are part of God's creation. Last podcast, we discussed friendship. And I think interestingly, respect is not friendship. No, and I think when we talked about friendship, we talked about that idea of it being two people giving and taking, that everybody has a part to play. Whereas respect, I feel, is a bit one-sided. You can choose to give respect to someone regardless of how they behave to you. Not reciprocated. No, it doesn't have to be. Yeah, it would be nice if it was. But we get upset if we don't. That's true. Yes. I think the other thing, for me, about respect, certainly the way I was growing up, and I was told, like, respectful, blah, blah, blah, blah, it felt a lot like I was being told, "Just stop being you. "Just don't be you right now because it's disrespectful. "Don't pick your nose. "Don't walk on the grass." I don't know, you know? Yeah, no, I think there's something in that. There's something about... I've lost my trades a lot now. There's something about respect being an action that we talk about as beyond belief. Like, what do you do? So, you respect someone, but then that then translates into how you treat them and how you respond to them. How? Cool. So, we often say to children in schools, you know, "Can you show some respect?" We don't say, "Can you feel some respect?" We say, "Can you show it?" Could you blow off some respect right now? Yeah, and that then translates into "behaviors" when we ask them to show respect, that actually, so often, respect is linked to a behavior and not talked about as a value. And actually, in that, if you took it back to a heart thing of that you really respected people because you tried to see them through God's eyes and see that value in them, that that would naturally then influence your behavior rather than, you know, you're talking about being made to not act like you. And I think that's because we sort of bypass that root thing of valuing it and valuing people and we jump straight to where respect is shown by standing very still. So, the problem here is that too often respect is performative and how do we get too deep down like the living out respect for others? And I guess not just others, it's like, you know, it's an environmental issue. It's a school property issue and it's all that business as well, isn't it? Respecting anything is that thing of, yeah, seeing the value in it and entreating it like it has worth and value. - We have a story here, don't we? When I was thinking about respect, my first thought went to David and Saul, Saul being king of all the world. (laughing) - Most of Israel, yeah. (laughing) - And David being his sort of servant, playing tennis, serving in his courts. - Yes. - And basically Saul was going to be a bonkers, a bit mad, it was not a good king and David respected him and never went against him even though clearly things were falling apart. And I actually found this story not a good story. I felt uncomfortable telling children about this story because I thought actually, what I'm saying here is if authority is doing a bad thing, you just have to go along with it. And that goes against, I think, sort of the nature of who God is in a way. I know there's this idea, strong idea that God appoints authority. But also there's this idea that we should speak truth to power and that we shouldn't just do a thing because that's what the boss says when we know it's a bad thing. - Yeah, and there's examples in Jesus's own life where he respected the laws even when he didn't agree with them. But there's also times when he stood up and said, no, this is wrong. And I'm not, you know, when he went in and he tipped the tables in the temples, some people probably would have said it was very disrespectful, but it's that idea of priorities, isn't it? And I think the story we've settled on is that one of Esther, which I think is a wonderful story because she does, she shows respect to the King and she shows respect to the cultures. But at the end of it in the essence, she says what is most important is protecting these people. And so she stands up for what she knows is right. And she finds the really healthy balance between respecting the rules and the ways she's, you know, the systems that are in place, she has to navigate to get to speak to the King. - It's not even civil disobedience. It's civilized obedience that somehow works its way out. And she trusts that she can be respectful, but also save her people, which is-- - Yeah. So it is a really good story to share. So that's the one we're running with. - That's the one we're running with. - Yes, absolutely. - It feels like a movie ready to be made. I feel like I'm rich, he needs to read the story of Esther and get on that already. - It is a wonderful, and there's also great examples in it of people not showing respect. - Yes. - The star, Queen Vashti, kind of refuses to come to meet with the King, she doesn't respect him and he takes offense at that. And then there's also the challenges of people not respecting one another's cultures and being disrespectful in that sense and attacking certain cultural groups. - A complex, interwoven story. - There's a lot of different layers of respect and disrespect. - So it's a really good one to share because it invites the children into a gripping story that, as you say, really explores what respect is and how that translates into real life in several different ways. - Yeah, and I think that I think about respecting culture and respecting differences is a really interesting thing. I know we talked about a bit of a game based on thinking about what marks respect in different countries. - Yeah, it's kind of like I went to market game and like a memory game. - Yes, so for each different country of the world, something that shows respect in that country, you can do an action for that and then keep adding to them and, yes, I went-- - I'm actually terribly sort of game, not because of a bad memory, but because I don't know enough about world cultures to say the right thing. - Yes, please definitely do your research and make sure that what you're describing as a cultural symbol of respect is accurate. - I went to England and I punched someone in the face. - I think sometimes we go a little bit extreme in being so desperate not to offend people that we can take the stream. I am, when I was living in South Africa, I was told very, one of the things going over there, I was told about cultural respect was that I might be offered sourd milk and that it was an honor to be offered this and that I needed to receive it and drink it and be respectful. And I was staying with the family and I went down for breakfast and I had my cereal, I poured the milk over and the milk was sour and my brain remembered this key bit of respectful information and I very quickly ate an entire bowl of sour milk and cereal. Yeah, exactly, I ate it at speed so I didn't throw up and after I eaten it very quickly I looked around and realised nobody else was drinking the milk. In fact, they were all having yogurt on their cereal and at the end of breakfast they turned to me and they went, oh, was the milk okay? We thought it might be off, that's why none of us were drinking it. And it turns out that they had not given me sour milk as part of a cultural tradition. It was just off and I was too polite and too respectful to say anything. But it's quite fun to explore what respect can mean different things. Yeah, so I sort of hear, I mean, that's a great story and I sort of hear that and I think, was it fear of offence and is that what we want to be getting the children to engage with? I'm afraid of offending, but obviously I'm offended it's like the phrase of the century. And I think that's the key thing, isn't it? Respect is not, that isn't what respect is. We don't respect others because we're worried about offending them, we respect them because we value them and it comes back to that. We celebrate who they are. And what they're about and it's interesting to engage with how they live their lives. Yeah, and it's the same thing, if you went to visit a place of worship over a different faith, you would respect their rules and their guidance about maybe taking your shoes off or covering your head and it's not necessarily because you agree with them, but it's because you value them. Yeah, and we've chosen hat, a hat as our object of respect. Because so often you take your hat off or you tip your hat, you used to tell me earlier what it was about salutes. Yes, so apparently the sort of modern day salute that the army does, salutes does, comes with that idea of tipping your hat so it's a little throwback to the hat tip, that mark of respect. Interestingly, so often in a Bible, you have to keep something on your head when you go into church as opposed to take it off, which is now, and I was researching and I don't really know why we do our hats, but it's something, I think universally recognised, the hats are something about who you are. Is it something, even maybe about what you're doing right now, maybe you're wearing a hard hat, or maybe you're wearing a chauffeur's hat? So you respect the danger and you wear a hard hat? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You're wearing a sun hat because you respect the power of the sun. Yeah, I know, often it's often those hats are kind of a mark of authority, aren't they? You know, people, like policemen will have a hat, you know, and it's a symbol of authority, and so I guess that thing of taking off the hat is that deference to, you know, as well, going, "I'm willing to take a lower place." Yes. Which is an interesting-- And the challenge then is to look beyond the hat. You see the hat, but actually there's a human sitting under it. Yes, you re-inspect them. Yes, you look again. Who is under the hat? So that's our object. And I quite like that we've got like a activity, a full of activity, we've made a spinner. I love a spinner. And just, you can print it, cut it out, stick a pencil for it and spin it round, and it's got things like your best friend. Look again at your best friend and sort of consider something new about them. Look again at someone you dislike and consider something new about them. Look again at an ugly object and consider something new about it. You find the beauty, I love that. I love that idea of, yeah, coming back to that re-inspecting object. Mm. And thinking you're fresh. Also we have an absolutely hilarious picture. We love our same horny illustrations. This I think is one of our favourites. What is the value, I think I love maybe different things from you. What's your favourite thing about it? Once the kid who's got his hand under his armpit making fart noises. Well, do you know what, I had looked at that and I had thought he was bowing deferentially to the person who farted. Oh, it is that as well. But I love the idea that actually he's just making fart noises. Yeah. I'm a big fan of the little girl who has a wonderful lion on her top, one finger up her nose, and the most epic hairstyle going on. And we've got this kid who's wearing a hat, but, and I find it so interesting for my reaction, he's wearing a hat, but it's covering his eyes. I'm like, that's so disrespectful. Yes. How not to be respectful of your hat. And then, yes, the boy on the end who has his hand on his heart and is being very respectful, I feel. Of course, I was trying to work at how, how is that a sign of disrespect? It's a sign of respect. Yes, he's a respectful one. Yeah, good kid. Well done you. Here we go. (laughs) That's what we want. Yes, but of course, man up to the outside, but God looks in the heart. So we actually don't know which of these kids are being the most respectful at all. So how do we encounter God through respect? I think my impulse is to be like, well, God made everything, so you should flip in well respect him. But that doesn't feel like the sort of thing I want to be saying. But I think it does come back to that essence of valuing everything that God has created. And that that actually is a positive thing, that we don't do it because we have to, but because we go, wow, God made this person, that they are fearfully and wonderfully made and everyone falls into that category. And we can follow this example. I think about the creation story or the latter one where Adam and Eve make a terrible mistake and they realize they're nude-y and they feel very ashamed and they want to escape from that. And God makes them close. He respects the predicament they've got themselves and out of his love and respect for them, he makes them close that they didn't need before. He does that because he respects them and he respects their feelings. Yeah, and I love that picture that God respects us, that God celebrates us. And there's a lovely verse where God talks about singing songs of joy over us, that he loves to celebrate who we are. And it's not a phrase that I would naturally think of that God respects me. But actually, when you look at the Bible and you look at people, even like Jonah who want to run the opposite way, God respected his decision and then went, "Okay, and now we'll guide you back." But yeah, I think it's a really, that idea of seeing the world and seeing other people through God's eyes. And that being what respect is. Through God's spect. God's spects. Is that, you maybe need to work on one? Respectacles? Respectacles, you know, can't do it. (laughs) Right, well, that's it. I pray that when you consider respect with your kiss, that it does go beyond structural performance and touches their hearts. See you next week. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) [MUSIC PLAYING]