Meredith Miller > Quotes

“The issue is when adults tell kids exactly what fruit should look like in their lives instead of helping them get to know the Spirit who grows the fruit. It’s when we fail to recognize that fruit can be faked by a kid, especially if they fear the disapproval of a loved one.”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“Everything falls apart so you can begin rebuilding yourself and your new reality.”
― Meredith Miller, The Journey: A Roadmap for Self-healing After Narcissistic Abuse

“Memory has ambushed her again, slamming down a wall between her and the present moment. Sometimes it comes in order, like a story, sometimes in flashes, like a series of snapshots. Sometimes it comes in a split second, cutting through the middle of another thought. It grabs her and won't let her pay attention to what is being said around her. Other times it just settles softly down on her like a pillow, cutting off air.”
― Meredith Miller

“We have gods called “good education,” “retirement plan,” “personal network,” and “health.” Any of these, and more, can be an idol when they complete this sentence: Whatever happens, it will all be okay because… We all have our own reasons that it’ll all be okay: • because of how much I have in the bank, my home equity, my retirement accounts. I can rely on that. I’ve made responsible decisions, and as long as I keep doing that, everything will be fine. • because the right people are in charge of our country, making the right decisions, appointing the right officials. • because I’m a good person, and so surely good things will come my way too. • because at least I have my family, and they will continue to give me meaning and purpose as I go through my days, even if other things don’t go the way I want. • because I am a hard worker, I’m self-sufficient, and I can take care of myself and those around me no matter what. • because I plan ahead and won’t be caught off guard.”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“Trust is always the precursor to obedience. The people’s obedience is not the first course of action they take, but rather a responsive action based on their determination that yes, indeed, Yahweh God of Israel can be trusted. Yes, obedience is talked about a lot in the Bible, but obedience is not our goal, because, ultimately, it is not God’s goal. Trust is.”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“The way forward from my complicated relationship with happy was not to force myself to see spiritual activities as fun, but to help myself see that fun activities are spiritual. I wasn’t giving God credit for the warmth of a belly laugh, the way a memory of a funny story could bring a smile well after it was told, or how our own chests swell whenever we are part of joy’s expansion to another person.”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“• You are a gift and a joy, and just who God made you to be. • God made you kind. God made you good. God made you YOU.”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“I realized that in order to fully pass this threshold of the self-healing journey after narcissistic abuse, I had to surrender my ego’s attachment to the false sense of security that I had created through isolation and not risking my heart in relationships.”
― Meredith Miller, The Journey: A Roadmap for Self-healing After Narcissistic Abuse

“After an exploratory conversation, the next step of the approach is to help a child respond using this key question: As I consider how God is X, or does Y, what would I like to say or do now? Responses can take many different forms. A child might: • Share a doubt or question • Make art, sing, or dance around • Share how they’re feeling and why • Show kindness or care for someone else • Try a Christian practice like lectio divina or imaginative prayer • Talk to God And yes, at times, a child might: • Take a step of faith in action”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“With God-centered storytelling as our interpretive framework, we can then use the specific approach of explore and respond.”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“The next criteria is fit. How does this practice fit with your real family? You might ask yourself, and talk with your partner about: • Does this idea fit who we are—our family’s personality, culture, and overall vibe? • Does it fit this season of our life together, or would it possibly be better in another season? • Does this practice stretch us, but in a good way? • Are we doing this because I think we “should”? • Do my kids seem to enjoy or resist this practice? The key is to move from the long list of options to just two or three things to start with. There is always time to add more later on, but too much at once will be overwhelming. You’re creating a sustainable rhythm, not doing Extreme Home Makeover: Faith Edition.”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“Predetermined prayers work much like that trail, I find. They don’t need to be fancy or crafted, but having them there at the ready can help us find our way to God’s presence. This is especially true in times of hardship. We don’t always remember that kids experience times of hardship (unless they, sadly, have gone through a particular trauma in life). But, as with adults, children have challenging seasons when they don’t know how to pray. During periods of sadness or confusion, we can introduce a ritual of praying one set prayer that can serve as a path to God’s presence.”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“What fascinates me about the app, in particular, is its ability to hear a bird in my yard, which also has constant white noise from the freeway, the intermittent revving of engines (it’s recently popular in my area to remove mufflers, so that’s fun), and the regular passing by of planes from our nearby airport. Engine after engine roars around my house, and yet I tap “sound ID” and the app tunes in to just the songs of the birds, hiding in plain sight in the branches nearby. Anchoring to a God who is with us is about finding the spiritual equivalent of Merlin Bird ID. It’s about the practices, habits, or rhythms that help us notice the music of God’s nearness amid the din of daily life. Like the birds in my yard, God is always there, and yet without tuning myself in to God’s presence, I’m liable to go long stretches not hearing the song of love that’s calling to me. How”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“Art as Prayer Prayers don’t need to be verbal to be authentic. Why not grab paper and colors, or sidewalk chalk, put on some music, and draw a prayer? You could give a prompt for the picture, such as: • Let’s draw the people we want to pray for today. • Let’s draw a time we felt sad or scared and ask God to help us if something similar happens again. • Let’s draw something we love to do and thank God for”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“In a very broad sense, you’ll find two major perspectives shaping children’s faith curriculum: One emphasizes biblical information—knowing not only the plot of Bible stories, but the details, often accompanied by an emphasis on Scripture memorization. This approach has been the opposite of “do less on purpose.” The other major perspective emphasizes biblical application—telling a child how the principle of a Bible story should be lived out in various everyday situations”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“After you narrow, it’s time to try them out. Begin by picking a time to try them. As you think about time, consider frequency, time of day, and duration. • Frequency: Does this practice make the most sense if it happens daily, weekly, monthly, or even annually? • Is it okay for this practice to happen when we feel like it? Or should it be a commitment we stick to? • Time of day: When do we all (kids and adults alike) have the best energy for this particular practice? For instance, your kids may have a bedtime energy that just doesn’t match the beautiful, calm worship playlist you’d like to have on. • Duration: Do we have any practices we find helpful, but we need to adjust how often we do them or how long they last?”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“As a guide, then, the key question of explore is: What does this story say about who God is or what God does? As you explore a story, you might do the following: • Read, paraphrase, or listen to a Bible story. • Look for who God is and what God is like. • Offer a key detail about the context of the story to help it make more sense in our time. • Invite interruptions from your kid and encourage their questions. • Notice the emotions of God and the humans at different points along the way. • See if you can connect pieces of this story to other stories in the Bible. • Try asking one question, such as: ○ What was your favorite part of this story? ○ What was the strangest part of this story to you? ○ How do you think people felt at the beginning, the middle, and the end? ○ What did you notice about who God is or what God’s like in this story?”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“Category Prayers Start here: Give your child a category to pray for and take turns naming something that fits in. You might say, “Let’s take turns thanking God for things in nature! I’ll name something, then you name something, and we’ll see how many we can think of.” When the list winds down, offer a simple closing, “God, You’ve made an amazing world. Thank You! Amen.”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“How To Do No Contact Like A Boss6”
― Meredith Miller, The Journey: A Roadmap for Self-healing After Narcissistic Abuse

“What I’m arguing is that children are better served by an approach that does three things: • enters each biblical story in its historical context first, instead of trying to mine the story for a timeless principle; • helps kids understand who God is, instead of focusing on the humans; and • invites them to respond to the story without a single prescribed application.”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“How do you start spinning your family’s web of faith? Name. Narrow. Try. Tinker.”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“One family described their core value of hospitality, lived out as they cleaned the house together each Friday for the express purpose of welcoming people over the weekend. They wanted to be able to spontaneously invite others over, knowing their space was ready to receive them. All this was explained to their kids by connecting the dots between the practice of keeping house and the immense welcome of God. They talked about their apartment as a gift and a refuge, and how important it was for it to feel inviting. Hosting people was not about living some Magnolia life; it was how they loved their neighbors. Thus, Friday night cleanup was a faith practice. One family used the tradition of a summer road trip to visit relatives as a means to support being who God uniquely made each of them to be. Each family member got to design the itinerary for one day of the trip. On that day, everyone else went along with that person’s choices for restaurants and an activity. They talked about the wonder of God’s image in each person and how this was a fun way to see each member of the family just as God made them to be. Thus, a family trip was a faith ritual. What about your family? What unique characteristics need to be accounted for as you craft a vision for faith? • Who makes up your family? List the members. You may share a living space with them or not, live in the same town or not, be relationally close or not. • Next to each person on the list, jot down a few distinguishing key traits of that person. What are they like? What are they interested in? • What are some of your family’s strengths and loves as a group? Do you love a good party? Cheer for a certain team? Love a particular place or meal? • What are some of your family’s unique challenges right now? Do you have a child who doesn’t “fit the mold,” for whatever reason? Are finances tight? Have any of the relationships been strained or broken? • List anything else that feels important to you about who your family is and what they are like. What other traits make you, you?”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“With this in mind, let’s turn our attention to four specific elements that can inform and guide you as you’re weaving the strands of that web: biblical exploration, experiences, rituals and traditions, and relationships”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“So, in the case of those “three Hebrew boys,” Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, if we mine their story for principles, we come up with something like, “You should stand up for God no matter what and God will always take care of you!” But if we first enter the story in its context, we start with the backdrop of exile. This was devastating to God’s people, disorienting and confusing. When a conquering king took over, that was seen as a sign that their god(s) were stronger than your god(s). The Hebrew people were facing the decision: Do we continue to trust Yahweh God, even here? Even now? Or should we bow to the gods of Babylon, and Nebuchadnezzar their king? Are those gods stronger? The choice is: Who will we trust to protect and provide for us? And standing up is the answer: We will trust Yahweh God of Israel. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego admit they might die, but even so they’re making that choice to trust. Even if it doesn’t “work,” meaning that God does not save them in the way they hope, they aren’t going to change course. This is important to the story: There are things about God’s character that these three draw upon to make their choice. The amazing display of protection offered in the midst of the fire is important, but they made the choice without knowing the outcome. They weren’t adhering to principles; they were standing on the trust they held in the person of Yahweh. We might ask kids: What do you think helped them decide what to do? What did they know about God? What stories were they remembering from the past?”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“• If school is difficult, you could pray a set prayer right before they go in that says, “God, as kiddo is in school today, help them know You are near and You care.” • If a sibling relationship is rocky, your child could pray a set prayer for the relationship like, “God, I don’t always get along with [sibling]. You are patient and slow to get mad. Help me practice that, too, and when I’m not, thanks for helping us mend things and try again.” • If your child has a stumper of a faith question that won’t be answered easily, you could have a set prayer about that very thing. In fact, this is what we did after that car conversation about proof. At bedtime, we had a set prayer of “God, Riley is having a hard time trusting that You’re here when You can’t be seen, touched, or heard like he hears me now. Would You help him know that’s okay, and would You help him get to know You as he grows?”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“What I believe, not what we believe. Describe the ways you disagree, the differences in theological understanding, or the distinctions between another worldview and your own as just that: your own. Adults sometimes say to kids, “This person or group believes X, but we believe Y.” However, your child is growing into what they believe. What’s more, your child’s love for you can make them feel pressured to align with you, and shut down the curious conversation that actually helps them determine their own views. Instead you can say, “I believe Y is true because… and I’m so glad you asked about this, because I’m here to help you figure out if Y is true too. What other questions do you have right now?” • Important history. Has this tradition or group been the subject of discrimination or violence historically, especially at the hands of politically or culturally powerful Christians? Share this information with them, so they understand why care and respect are so critical. This might sound like, “We always want to treat people kindly, of course. But it’s also important that you know that [group] has been treated especially poorly in the past. Sometimes when people feel sure they are right, they think that makes it okay to be mean to folks they’re ‘sure’ are wrong. This has been especially true when a group feels sure they are right and they have a lot of power. But even when we hold very different views, it’s important that everyone be safe, and for us to be part of not just kindness, but protection for all people.”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“When I say that your family needs to weave your own web, this is how you get there. It’s intentional and ordinary. It’s spiritual and also simple. Such is the power of weaving your own web. You get to partner with the Holy Spirit to craft a way of living life that is joyful, sustainable, and anchored to the character of God. Instead of trying to shove your family into a box, you let your web take on the unique shape and structure it needs to help you all know and trust God more and more. All the while, it feels like you, the way that weaving is ordinary for the spider. And ordinary is enough.”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“But that is precisely what makes them unhelpful to our goal of helping our kids get to know God. One is too focused on the plot details and the other is too focused on the people. Allow me to explain.”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“What often gets called obedience is actually moralism, teaching kids to be good rather than helping them get to know the God who is good.”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From

“There is another reason I’m starting with God’s goodness. It’s where the Bible starts. Before the world existed, God existed, which means love and goodness have always been, and will always be. And to emphasize this point, the creation narrative declares, over and over again, “God is good. God is good. God is good.” When I tell kids the creation story from Genesis 1–2, I tell it like this: In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. There had been nothing at all, and God’s Spirit hovered over the waters. Then God said, “Let there be light, and there was light.” God spoke and there was… Light and dark. Day and night. God spoke and sky and land were made. God spoke and plants were made. The sun, moon, and stars. God spoke and land animals, birds, and ocean creatures were made. Every time, God says just a word and things are made. God can create with just Their voice. God speaks, and there is goodness all around. We know it’s good because there used to be chaos, but God gave things order. There used to be emptiness, but God started filling it up. For the people who first knew God and gave us God’s story in the Bible, these were clues that led to a very important truth.”
― Meredith Miller, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn't Have to Heal From