Giving hurts

 It's better to give than to receive, right?

Right?

We decided to work on this concept with our three year old this season.

In hindsight, perhaps I should have chosen a day when he was not on steroids (for croup) to take him to give away a toy.  'Roids cause rage.

Perhaps I also should not have ventured to the Toys for Tots drop off location at Toys 'R Us - 2 weeks before Christmas and on 50% off day.

It all began maybe a month ago when we began explaining to Will that there are children who don't have any toys because their parents don't have enough money to buy them toys.  This was a bit abstract for him so I created "Max."  Max is a little boy, age 3, whose Mommy & Daddy don't have any money to buy him toys or food.  Max has nothing.  Will began playing pretend games where I had to be Max & he would bring me loads of toys from his room in his big dump truck.  (One day, I pretended great excitement at the dump truck toy arrival and said it was the best Christmas ever - only to be corrected that it wasn't Christmas yet - it was "trash day." )

We've talked a lot about Max and what he might want for Christmas.  Will came up with a few items (Buzz Lightyear was one of them) & we went to the toy store and purchased them.  

And then it was the day to giveaway the toys.

He was not happy.

He couldn't understand why he couldn't keep the Buzz toy.  A part of me was tempted to go home when the first drop off location I attempted was shut down.  But I stuck to it.  He sobbed and sobbed and sobbed.

I tried reason.  I called my mom and she tried to reason with him.  We reminded him how much Jesus gives us.  We talked about how excited he would be to get a new toy for Christmas.  We reminded him that he already owns a Buzz (or a few of varying sizes actually.)

Finally, it was go time.

We exited the car on perhaps the most crowded day of the year at the toy store.  Pure brilliance on my part.  We walked in.  He held his toy and though he had tears on his face, he was not resisting.  He knew what he had to do.

We found the lady and he handed her the toys one at a time.  He told her they were for Max (she looked confused.)

And then he really burst into big tears as soon as we stepped out those doors.

On the way home, he asked if Santa was going to go to Max's house and why that wouldn't be enough.  He cried and cried.

The Salvation Army bucket didn't phase him at all.  He liked putting money in that.  I think it's because money doesn't have as much value to him as Buzz at this point.

But at bedtime, when he was telling God about the experience, I managed to get a good, long list out of him of toys and things he has to be thankful for.

And this morning, he woke up and told me Max is his friend.

It hurt to give something away he wanted.  

It was painful... for all of us.

But, I'm glad we did it.  

I think in future years, I will do a few things differently.  I'd like to actually have a specific family we give to - I think if he could see real names and wish lists and maybe even see them receive the packages - that would really impact him and be more concrete.  He's never had a problem with birthday parties, for instance.   He enjoys picking out a toy for a friend and giving it to them and doesn't think he is entitled to one as well at someone's party.  I think the mysterious Max was just a bit abstract and confusing - handing a toy over to a random woman just didn't make a lot of sense to him.

I will also not go to the toy store on 50% off day.

I hope to introduce him to poverty at some point in the next couple of years.  Will has no concept of real poverty.  He's never seen children who are hungry.  He's never seen children who truly don't have toys or clean clothes.  I mean, he's seen poverty at some level - we've spent time at lots of major pediatric hospitals - but he doesn't recognize it in those settings.  I can remember vividly as a child when my parents took us to the "bad" part of town to deliver Christmas gifts to families.  I remember serving in a soup kitchen alongside my dad.  I remember cleaning a house that was roach infested and so nasty.  I've travelled on mission trips to extreme poverty and spent a summer in Guatemala working at a children's home. I've seen people living in a dump and mothers who work as prostitutes to put food on the table.  I've attended a church under I35 with the homeless and washed a homeless man's feet.    I taught in a school where over 90% of the student population was under the poverty line - my students rarely had school supplies of their own and most were entitled to free lunches and breakfasts.   I remember on a family trip to Mexico, we rented a jeep once and drove to a poor area - I'll never forget as a little girl watching children bathe in a river alongside animals.  

I know how to recognize poverty.

Thankfully, we have been blessed and my three year old has no concept.

But I don't want him to grow up like that.  I want him to recognize and acknowledge his blessings and use them to give back to bless others.

I don't know if we accomplished anything this week for Max except that maybe we began setting the foundations.

Or maybe he just learned that giving hurts.  I'm not sure he's gotten it that it brings such joy yet.  Although, we did role play last night and his eyes lit up as I (pretending to be Max) got so excited about my new Buzz Lightyear.  

How are you teaching your children to give?  All ideas are welcome.  Unless, of course, your three year old has given away all their toys to live a minimalist lifestyle and quotes scripture all day long and only has "world peace" on their Christmas wish list.