Our Busy Little World
Dec. 6, 2006 - Part Two: Loving The Standard
More from Matt and Evers:
Evers: I had a question regarding this point: “If your children don’t love the standard, lower your standards until they love them, THEN wade into the deep end.” How does this play out in practice? Let them go wild cuz they love that standard? :-) And what do we do to help our children “love” the standards, and not just “obey” them? Just looking for a little more “flesh” to the theory. . . On another note, our church isn’t family-integrated. They have “children’s church,” but are open to parents keeping children with them during service… that gives us a little less freedom than if were in a church whose philosophy were family-integrated worship as the norm.
Matt: Well, I figured you would ask me to expound on what I meant…..as if I know what I’m doing…DOH!
I will preface this by letting you know that I am in need of hearing this myself and we often feel like we are flying by the seat of our pants here. We do happen to be very blessed in our church situation where we are immersed in a community of about 1500 reformed folk who are very consciously aware of raising their children in the nurture and admonition of the LORD. We have a TON of resources to glean knowledge from. So, that being said, I will attempt to provide a little more clarification.
By “lowering” the standard, I am in no way trying to say that we should “glory” in that or stay at a low standard. What happens often is that we forget that we need to teach our children the “perfect law of LIBERTY” and that Christ’s yoke is truly “easy”. We should start, fundamentally, with the foundational issues in our children before attempting to build the house. Totalitarian governments like to “anticipate” violations and make a myriad of rules that only a lawyer can figure out. The common people are left unawares of the law and the government can at any point find a technical violation to “nab” you on. Conversely, case law allows for liberty and freedom with fewer laws so that the people may understand the spirit of the law or law giver. We want to establish the case laws and principles in our children. Once the foundational principles are firmly established and understood by our children, we can move on to some more detailed law. We should be trying to train them to think something like, “I know mom and dad didn’t specifically SAY I couldn’t do that, but I know them (and the general principles of the law) well enough to know that I shouldn’t do that.” My girls love to “get out” on technicalities. Boys I hear are much more directly rebellious, but I wouldn’t know yet…..
Practically speaking, this may mean simplifying some things. Try not to be annoyed at minor fidgeting in church. Is it really that important in God’s eyes if the kids have their hands folded throughout the entire service? If they sing the ABC’s during worship instead of the song that they don’t know, is it so bad? Are we being too fussy to smile at our children during service or tickle their ear? Do we show affection towards them in the service? My tendency in the past has been to be the “fussy tidy minded little Christian that wants perfect little angel children who have had a thorough baptism in lemon juice prior to entering the Lords house…..” I am really trying to break that habit because I don’t want to have my kids think joy is some abstract term on Sundays. I want my kids to think Sunday is the best day of the week…full of practical, hands on, tangible, JOY.
I guess I’m trying to say, “pick your battles”. Watch how many you get into. Example….when you are leaving a guest’s house and you call your children to you, you have created a battle that you MUST win. Instead, if you know your children are tired and this may provoke a battle you don’t want to have in front of your friends, just go over and pick the child up. You could also provide a warning…We have had success with this.. “Isabelle and Hannah, we have five minutes before we’re leaving…” It helps prepare them for the departure.
Family Worship can be a battle. If your kids constantly struggle through it, try to shorten it. (In theory) I’d rather have 5-10 min of joyful worship than 30-45 min of doctrinally correct lessons with lengthy prayers (I really struggle with this one). Do you have a hard time getting the little ones through the great, lengthy, classic hymns? Shorten them up, at least for now. Do a verse or two at a time, or even do a fast paced modern song that quotes scripture. Do some fun, silly songs that you know they’ll enjoy. I want to pack so much “good reformed stuff” in that I usually make it too long for my kids. This makes them restless and squirmy so much so that it distracts me and them and then they miss the actual “depth” of what I’m saying anyway. I need to learn to give it to them a little at a time and really let them enjoy it at their level. They are small children and I often forget that. It is really ironic that I am typing all of this, because tonight was a particularly hard Family Worship night (for me, mostly). The kids didn’t seem to be bothered, but daddy was a grouch. I am rambling more to give myself some pointers for the next few weeks….so I apologize if this doesn’t help. We try to structure our worship time with a liturgical feel. I start off by saying “Give thanks to the LORD for He is good”……and everyone responds…. “His mercies endure forever! Blessed be the name of our God!” This gives our children a chance to be directly involved with worship. We also do catechism questions…The children’s catechism is their FAVORITE part of Family Worship. It has been a wonderful “game” for them to play every night.
Pharisees exercised authority over and upon the people in an oppressive way by binding them under heavy loads and burdens (high standards) and lacked the love and grace, which was the more fundamental principle. They inverted the law. Christ spoke out against them for lacking love and grace (foundation), not for having high standards (tithing mint and cumin for example….”for this you ought to have done”). Psalm 119 is replete with sayings like: “Your testimonies are wonderful…How sweet are Your words to my taste, sweeter than honey in my mouth….. But I delight in Your law…Oh how I love Your law…..etc” learning to love Gods law (rules) is fundamental. Love is fundamental. If we are teaching our kids to obey without love then we are raising Pharisees, not children that honor God. The children’s catechism says “How do you glorify God? ….By LOVING Him and obeying His commands”.
The best way of teaching our kids how to love the standards and not just outwardly obey them is by imitation. Do we love the standards? Do we love God’s law or are we just outwardly giving obeisance? Are we joyful or baptized in lemon juice? Is the overarching theme in our home characterized with joy and gladness (not cheesy chipperness, but true joy and thanksgiving)? Do we sing Psalms and spiritual songs because we want to? Are we expecting our children to love things that we don’t truly love? As our children grow older and mature they will pick up on our sincerity or our hypocrisy. They learn from imitation. Don’t let your children get away with complaining. They must learn to obey and obey joyfully. No stomping of the feet when they clean up their toys….No back-chat when told to do something….no fussing over food that has been given….Complaining and grumbling is a deadly sin that can easily creep into a home and bring it to ruin. We must “count it all joy when we encounter various trials….do all things without complaining…..rejoice in the Lord always, again I say rejoice.” Sadly, I have many times caught myself grumpily telling my children to be joyful and not complain. Oh don’t worry I always had the pathetic excuse that “If they would only be joyful it sure would be a heck of a lot easier for me to be joyful….who can I bring this complaint to?….because, I was perfectly joyful until these little disobedient, grouchy, complaining, munchkins irked me.”…..sigh. Obviously I have issues.
But as God has bestowed love and grace to me, so I am learning to do the same to my children. They are God’s property, not mine. I have been given the arduous and rewarding task of being God’s steward over His children. God has entrusted me with the high calling of imitating Him to my children. My actions/reactions speak much louder about God than my words do. I wonder what my children would think their heavenly Father was like if all they had to base their knowledge off of was the actions of their earthly father. It is a rather sobering thought. Each day we tell our children that they have a heavenly father that loves them and takes care of them and the only context they have of a father is us. If God were standing there during our discipline sessions, would He be satisfied with how we, as stewards, are disciplining them? Every day we either speak the truth about Jesus to our family or we speak slander……
By God’s grace alone I pray I don’t slander God’s true Fatherhood. By God’s grace alone I pray that my children know His love displayed through me. By God’s grace alone I pray that my marriage is an accurate and worthy representation of God’s marriage to His Church. By God’s grace alone can we ever hope to not screw up our children’s eternal souls. The comfort in all of this is that God obviously thought we could do this….you and I are both in a similar situation (child-wise). I thank God that “He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Christ Jesus.”
Comments
Dec. 6, 2006 - Untitled Comment
Posted by mamaduso
"If God were standing there during our discipline sessions, would He be satisfied with how we, as stewards, are disciplining them? "
Ouch!
Very good Matt. Thank you. I will have to reread this as I take in a little at a time. I have the book Melissa recomended and read half of it before it got put down and forgotten about. Time to get it out again.
I love the phrase "baptised in lemon juice". How fitting for some of our situations at home. Ouch again!
Susan
