The One-Foot Gate
On a recent Sunday morning during our time of worship, I looked across the aisle and saw a young mother and her toddler sitting near the front. Then, I saw something I don’t remember seeing before. Ninety-three-year-old Miss Margaret (not her real name) came quickly up the aisle to sit with them. Because she is the grandmother and great-grandmother of the pair, I wasn’t surprised that Miss Margaret joined them. I was surprised by her doing it when we were “supposed” to be in our seats, but I shouldn’t have been. I already knew that Miss Margaret is a kindred spirit who feels as I do that the best seat in church is the one beside a grandchild.
The toddler behaved well. Of course, he wasn’t perfectly still, but he was not at all distracting. I admit to being a bit distracted myself, not by his behavior, but by the joy of the scene as I watched his mama and great-grandmother sweetly and quietly keeping him quiet.
Once, when the little boy started to act as if he might make an escape, Miss Margaret, at the aisle end of the pew, raised her left foot to make a little gate. It was just enough at just the right time.
As I chatted with the young mama after church, she expressed her appreciation for her grandmother’s help. I have continued to replay my mental video of Miss Margaret’s one foot rising to corral her precious great-grandson. It reminds me of:
- Multigenerational family love.
- The need for and the power of limits for children and for grown-ups.
- The beauty of gentle discipline.
- The importance of paying attention and being ready with a gentle limit at the precise moment a child needs it.
- God loving all of us enough to say, “This far and no further.”
All discipline for the moment
seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful;
yet to those who have been trained by it,
afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.
Hebrews 12:11