'significant conversations'

Someone I was seeing today used a phrase I've often used myself.

'Significant conversations'.

They happen. You can't always tell in advance just when they're going to happen. And it's often the case that they happen at times which may not be convenient to yourself. Times when you'd rather be fast asleep in your bed, or doing something else.

But whenever it is that they happen, they're moments of great opportunity. They're times when there's not just the chance to be saying some pretty important things, but times when there's also a real and unusual receptiveness on the part of the other person.

Parents, not least, have, from time to time, those 'significant conversations' with their children.

Choose the wrong moment, and they don't rise above being a 'lecture'. Important things are maybe being said, but if there isn't that basic receptiveness ... well, it's hardly a 'conversation' and it's probably not significant.

But there are those moments when a daughter or son (or a grandchild, of course) will want and need to speak.

Parents need wisdom to see when those moments have come.

They also need grace to embrace them - because often they'll come at times which are hardly convenient. Late at night, or when they've got a hundred different things they're trying to do.

They need patience as well in the way they develop the flow of the conversation. As in lighting a fire, the big lumps of coal are never put on from the start. You start with the kindling and bit by bit the fire is teased into flame: it's a while before the logs and the big lumps of coal can be placed on top and the fire is established and strong.

These 'significant conversations' are important and necessary things in the lives of our children - whatever their age or their stage. But they're delicate things as well.

And that's what the man I was speaking with earlier today was really on about, I think. He was talking about his mother, and the way in which she ensured there were those 'significant conversations' with the children she had borne.

It's through such 'significant conversations' that great dynasties of faith are built. And it's one of the marks of godly, gracious parents that they have these conversations with the children they are raising for the Lord.

Spotting the moment - that needs wisdom and discernment.

Seizing the moment - that needs selflessness and grace.

And igniting the moment - that needs patience, care and boldness.

We pray for one another that the Lord would always give us just that wisdom, grace and boldness - and that fires of faith would once again, and bit by bit, be lit across our land.