Parenting With Grace October 27, 2002
Grace Based Relationships Part 3
Ephesians 6:4
On the first week we looked at relationships where grace is not in place
We talked about how when we try to control those around us for our own purposes we are living in the curse that Adam and Eve received when they sinned. (And though you may desire to control your husband, he will be your master.” Gen. 3:16 NLT with footnote) And we are trying to take over God’s job – to shape and mold people according to his good purpose.
We talked about how we are born with a “Holy Spirit shaped hole” in our hearts, and in order to fill that emptiness, we often concentrate on the exterior, performance orientated areas of our life. After awhile, we realize that no amount of success or sin can fill that hole, so we go looking for someone else to fill the hole – usually a mate or family member. They look good on the outside, but because they are just as empty on the inside as we are, they can’t fill our emptiness, and we cannot fill theirs. So we start to try to shape them into the type of person that can fill our emptiness.
We talked about how this is idolatry. Whenever we go to another person or thing to do for us what only God can do for us, we are treating them as another god, and it is idolatry.
Last time we looked at how when we are filled with the Spirit, and living our lives by the power of the Spirit, we no longer need to look to others to fill our emptiness, and we do not have to manipulate and control them so that they will fill our emptiness!
So because we are strengthened in our inner being by the Holy Spirit, we have the strength to submit to one another!
It is one of those Christian paradoxes – God gives us strength, not so we can rule over, but so we can serve!
Parents (fathers) do not provoke your children to anger
Three Words for Anger
“Perigismos” = “seething hostility” -anger that is forced to exist beneath the surface or suppressed anger
“Thumas” = “outbursts of anger”
“orgay” = “anger” “in you anger do not sin” Ephessians 4:26. This means that having this kind of anger is not automatically a sin! Orgay comes the closest to the pure experience of anger. This kind of anger is not good or bad. It is simply a signal that something important to us has been threatened or damaged
So what does it mean, then to be angry but not sin? In the context, Paul says, “therefore, laying aside falsehood, speak truth, each one of you, with his neighbour, for we are members of one another. Be angry, and yet do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and do not give the devil an opportunity’ Jeff teaches then that Paul is telling us that when we are angry with someone, we are to go and talk to that person.
Consequently, being angry at someone and telling others instead is to be angry and to sin. Being angry at someone and spreading rumors, giving negative hints in a conversation or insulting them, is to be angry and to sin. In fact, the text demonstrates that being angry and doing nothing – letting “the sun go down on your anger” - is sinning. Ignored anger can grow into perigismos – seething hostility, or thumas – an outburst of anger, neither of which is good. If yo are angry with someone, talk to them.
The word that is used in Ephesians 6:4 is perigismos – seething anger – do not provoke your children to seething anger. Jeff gives us some of the ways that we do provoke them to seething anger.
Not allowing our children to express their anger
The most obvious way to provoke children into a state of repressed anger is to not let them express it. If you ask your child to stop watching television and perform a chore they were supposed to be doing, you may get an answer something like: "I’m really angry that I have to do this," or the child may simply show his anger by stomping or complaining. In response, many Christian parents would say, "Don’t you ever let me hear you talk like that, [ or act like that] ," or "You are making Jesus sad by being angry," or "Go to your room and don’t come out until you can be polite." If so, you are provoking them to seethe. They may decide to hide their anger in order to avoid the consequences of displeasing you-or because they think it’s their job to make sure Jesus has a good day-or so that they can avoid having to go to their room. And when they respond to this kind of pressure, and do not show their anger, you may praise them and praise the Lord that you don’t have an angry child-but don’t get too excited. You simply have an angry kid with perigismos - that is, an expert at letting the sun go down on anger.
Rather than provoke children to seethe, it is better to acknowledge their anger. Tell them that you appreciate their telling you about their anger, or the fact that they are angry, even though they may still be required to do the chore they don’t like.
Often, rather than verbalize anger, a child will communicate it by behavior - for instance, they may storm away and slam the door. The problem is not the anger, but the manner in which it is expressed. The goal of discipline should be to help them express their anger "by the Book." If, for instance, your child storms off in anger and slams a door, say something like this: "1 can see that you’re angry with me. But it’s not okay for you to run off and slam the door in my face. That doesn’t help our relationship. If you’re angry with me, say so. I can understand that you might be upset? but you: still have to do your job."
Living with double standards
If it’s not okay for the kids to litter, it’s not okay for you. If you want them to care about the law, you have to keep the speed limit. (They can always tell when you don’t.) If you want your children to care about God and church, but in your heart you don’t-who are you kidding?
Speaking, thinking, and feeling for your kids
Jeff tells the story of buying special sandals called Thomas Heel sandals for his daughter, Erin, and watching a mother and daughter attempting to do the same.
He writes: we watched as the little girl next to us tried on a beautiful, braided leather pair, decorated with colored beads. They didn’t fit. Then she tried on a second pair-not very pretty, but not bad as Thomas Heel shoes go. They didn’t fit either. Then she tried on a plain, ugly pair that fit like Cinderella’s glass slippers. The mom immediately said, "We’ll take these."
The little girl then pitched a fit. She screamed, whined, pleaded, and finally threw herself on the floor. All the time the girl was doing this, the mother was holding up the ugly pair and saying to her daughter, "Oh, we like these sandals, don’t we? And don’t we think they’re beautiful?"
Erin was looking at the woman with a peculiar, scrunched-up expression on her face that seemed to be saying, Look, lady, we four-year-olds know ugly sandals when we see them. Who are you kidding? I have to admit that I myself was a little confused about who the "we" was that this lady was talking about. She must have had a mouse in her pocket who concurred with her assessment of the sandals, because her daughter certainly didn’t agree.
That little girl was sad and angry because she couldn’t get the sandals she wanted. And the more the mother tried to fix her disappointment, the angrier the child got. And the more her mom tried to get her to conceal her anger, the more furious she grew.
We may need to help our children learn to express their feelings in appropriate ways, but if we repeatedly discount a child’s feeling, those outward feelings will soon turn to seething hostility.
Turning a deaf ear
Paul Lewis says “Every child should have the chance to defend his or her innocence before being disciplined. Circumstances of which we’re unaware might make a difference in our response to this misbehavior.
When parents are “absent”
Some of you know that since moving much of my free time has been engulfed by renovations. A few weeks ago, I was installing our kitchen cabinets when Benjamin came to me with ball in hand and asked me to come and play catch. I did the “good dad” thing and I put my tools down, and we went into the back yard and played catch. We started standing, and ended up sitting tossing the ball to each other and talking. It was at that point that he said “Daddy, when you are done fixing the new house, can we play together more?” It broke my heart. And since then, I have trying to not get so engulfed in renos and spend some good playtime with the kids.
The psalmist says, "Behold, children are a gift of the Lord; the fruit of the womb is a reward" (127:3). They are important enough to be around for. When you neglect to spend time with your children, they feel hurt, angry, and like they don’t matter. Some parents only know what’s happening in their children’s lives because they hear about it, not because they were there to see it.
If you are the kind of parent who is not around enough to hear about your children’s needs-or if you force them into silence when they do speak up about your absence-you are causing them to seethe with anger.
When we shame our children
When people receive messages about themselves that they are de- fective, unloved, worthless, and that they can never measure up, their basic identity is formed around a horribly wounded self-image.
Rather than addressing basic issues with our children, we often use the whole weight of our authority to point out how defective they are: "You made a fuss-and the problem is you. What a rebellious, miserable, embarrassing child you are. You’re so awful I’m ashamed to be seen in public with you." This crushes a child’s spirit, and leaves them seething with unresolved conflict and anger.
“Bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord”
Many Christian parents focus on the words discipline and instruction and overlook the “bring up” part. “Bring up” has uplifting, nurturing, serving connotations. Remember what I said about submitting; it means coming under. We are not to beat down or force into. It is not our job to turn our children into Christian replicas of Pavlov’s dogs, barking out the right Bible verse for every occasion. Rather, we are to build them into deeply faithful adults.
Our children’s biggest struggle is the same as ours: we are all fighting to draw our sense of significance, have our real needs met, and to view ourselves as loved and accepted on the basis of Christ’s performance and not our own.
It is not that behaviors do not matter, they do. Learning to make right choices matters a great deal. Obedience to the things of God are not optional, it is Mandatory. But it is also simply consistent with the fullness we have in Christ. We want our children to behave, not out of fear, coercion, shaming, or a twisted view of God. We want them to obey out of an ever increasing understanding and gratitude for the grace of God in their life!
Jesus promises us that he has put a well inside us. From that inner well will flow life. Our task is to remember to drink from that well, instead of from all the wells that promise to fill us but never can. Being good athletically, having lots of friends, or achieving good grades cannot fill our children. We need the well on the inside, and so do our children. We need to allow ourselves to be filled daily, minute by minute, with the Spirit, and so do our children!
I was at a conference this week on Natural Church Development, and I ended up having lunch with a couple of Salvation Army people who had been touched by renewal. We got on to the topic of inner healing for past wounds. I was reflecting on my own up bringing and wondering why I wasn’t feeling this great need for inner healing (maybe I’m just fooling myself). What I came to realize is that my parents were never perfect parents, they are human, but what they did do was instill in us kids an understanding that it is in God that we find our self worth, our strength and our purpose. What a great blessing to learn that great truth at a young age. I hope to instill the same truth in my children.
I think that we are getting there. Last year when Doris, Benjamin’s nursery school teacher asked the kids who loves you, Benjamin blurted out, “God loves me!” As I’m walking down the street with Nicholas in my arms, I often ask him the same question as a game – he always answers “God loves me.” When I ask “who else?” to get to me, he says “Jesus loves me.” “Who else?” “Mommy loves me.” “Who else?” “Daddy loves me!”
The Discipline of Faith
It is interesting to compare the books of Galatians and Colossians. Paul was angry at the Galatians. His letter to them is a scathing confrontation of the fact that they had been "walking by the flesh" instead of the Spirit. But the "flesh" for the Galatians was not pornography, drunkenness, or thievery. The Galatians had begun to measure their acceptance spiritually by whether or not they performed certain religious behaviors. They let religious performance direct the way they acted, instead of allowing the Spirit to do so. Paul calls this "walking in the flesh."
To the Colossians, on the other hand, Paul says this:
For even though I am absent in body, nevertheless I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good discipline and the stability of your faith in Christ. As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, having been firmly rooted and now being built up in Him and established in your faith (2:5-7).
Paul was excited to see their stability and discipline. But he wasn’t complimenting them on their perfect church attendance, tithing, or daily devotions. Yes, these are all good practices, but Paul was rejoicing in their spiritual stability, which was rooted in their faith in Jesus. Unlike the Galatians, they were hanging on to Jesus.
Paul urged the Colossians to keep living in Christ the same way they came to Him in the first place-by faith. Jesus was the soil their "faith roots" were planted in, and this living faith is what would continue to build them up.
We need to take those opportunities that life gives us to build our children’s faith in the power of Jesus in their life. Jeff tells of one time when another girl was bullying his daughter Jesi. After one rather harrowing incident , Jeff and his wife sat down with Jesi.
"You must really be a powerful person, Jes," we suggested.
"What do you mean?"
"Well, that other girl is spending so much energy and time on you. So it must be really important to her what you think."
"Hmmm," purred Jes, considering.
The next day, the same girl started in on Jesi again. "I must really be a powerful person," Jesi suggested.
"What do you mean?" the other girl asked.
"Well, you’re spending so much energy and time on me, it must be really important to you what I think."
"Hmmm," growled the girl, considering.
She never bothered Jesi again. Even this child, who knew nothing about the filling of the Spirit, knew that she would not really feel any more important if she beat up Jesi VanVonderen.
Our job as Christian parents is to draw our children’s attention to what is real – what is true – and not to try to control how they feel.
The Importance of Modeling
I think Scripture displays an even more powerful way of conveying the way we draw life from Jesus Christ: It is absolutely essential for us as parents to fight the faith fight ourselves, so that our children see us struggling with the same issues and winning. I am talking about being living models of faith.
Deuteronomy shows us the pattern for bringing up our children "in the discipline and instruction of the Lord." Look at it:
Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is one! And
you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with
all your soul and with all your might (6:4, 5).
This is the message we must pass on: Have one God. Don’t try , to get your inner needs met from a bunch of puny, substitute, false gods. Love and be loved by our one, true God, with every ounce of strength. In fact, that is what it will take!
And these words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart (v. 6).
This is the method, step number one for communicating the message: Write it on your heart. The message that God is our life must be the message written on the tablets of our heart before it can be our children’s message.
And you shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up. And you shall bind them as a sign on your hand and they shall be as frontals on your forehead. And you shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates (w. 7-9).
Step number two: Pass on to your children the message that has first been ingrained in your heart.
Pass on timeless truth that it is a fight to have one God.
Let your faith in one God flow out from inside you; let it be displayed in everything you do outwardly as a result.
