Mom Guilt & Fatherly Frustration

The culture and the world has taught parents to believe in the axioms of sports, academics and the arts as the path of parenting. Set goals, build processes, reach outcomes. Our over emphasis on reason and the rational capacity of our kids is what is driving your mom guilt and fatherly frustration. This episode I try to explain why we do it, and how trusting the unseen works of God as the cure. 

Transcript

Ethan: 0:00

Raising joyful children in an angry world, a podcast dedicated to faithful parents navigating their families through a stormy culture

0:08

Well, it has been a few weeks since, I've been on the podcast. This is Raising Joyful Children in an Angry World. I am Paul Osborne. As I mentioned a few podcasts ago, we're getting ready to kind of wind this down and transition to a different podcast with some different ideas, but I wanted to share some things that have come to my mind as we sort of wind this down, some sort of ending ideas. And one of them is. The limits of reason why it is so hard for parents as we're raising kids to see what I call the limits of reason. We give a child a clear, logical explanation, and yet somehow Gets murky in their heads and they don't follow it, and we get very frustrated about it. And so I wanted to offer, I think, some ideas from the scriptures for Christian parenting about the limits of reason. I believe I may have said this before, Blaine Pascal had said that the heart knows reason. That reason knows nothing of, in other words, we are not just rational, logical beings, but our heart has emotions and things inside of it. That go beyond the framework of reason. And in fact, I think if you wanna get philosophical, we could even say that, you know, total reason is actually unreasonable. That there's a limit to reason but I believe that the. The, the cause of why this is so hard for parents to trust is something I wanna talk about, why it's so hard to trust it, and then what I think the benefits are of coming to a Christian understanding of it, particularly in a day and age where so many people seem to be holding such high anxiety in raising their children. Mom, guilt, dad, guilt, uh, all that kind of stuff. I think if you, you get this, if you kind of see this, I think it'll help you and be beneficial, help you relax and just kind of enjoy raising your kids and, and resetting your expectations as to what reason and logic can do. Again, I think the reason why, what's the cause we put so much trust in this and I think all of us have been trained. Whether we've taken music up or sports or academics, or we spent how many years or x number of years in the workplace that the way the world works is it says, well, you set a goal, right? So a goal might be to make, the first team the starter, maybe first chair in an orchestra to get straight A's or to make the honor roll. You set a goal, then you build a process. In other words, what you have to do to make first chair, to make, the starter, to be the honor roll kid. And then, when you reach that outcome, you sort of receive that identity. Oh, you're the starting quarterback. You're the starting pitcher. You are first chair in the orchestra. You've got the little, thing for honor roll. You are on that list. And in the Kingdom of God, it works in the opposite order. God declares the out the identity outcome. Before we get involved in any process, particularly with our kids and before goals are achieved, God comes to us first. He says things like in John, to those who believe, who trust in His name, he gives the right to become the children of God and such We are. In other words, we're declared the children of God, or, or when Jesus says, let the little children come unto me for theirs, is the Kingdom of Heaven something we say at the end of this podcast all the time? That's an identity and it is given early, very early to our kids. It it's really incredible how that actually works. And this process that has us involved in our instruction, which I'm not saying we don't use logic in raising kids, but it's kind of like a train, uh, on one side of the track that we can see is our instruction and our advice, our rules, whatever you want to call them, and how the kids react to that. And then on the other side. Is God and he's working in what the Psalmist calls the secret heart, the internal parts of their being. And where we get outta whack on this is we put all kinds of trust and emphasis on the logic, on our instruction, on the what we think is reasonable. And we don't put enough trust. I'm not saying we don't put any, but we don't put enough trust sometimes in that God's doing his work internally in their heart. He has already claimed them. And he is going to work out what the scriptures say has been worked in. And this process, comes at agrarian speed, the raising of kids. When you look at the scriptures, it's about planting seeds and waiting for the harvest and bearing fruit, or finding the sheep that's wandered from the flock. All these kinds of agricultural. Type things. Yet we live in the instant world. So it's, it's very easy for us to get caught up in, okay, here's your goals, here's your process. Now get it done. And, and yet the scriptures are telling us that there's something going on in the secret heart, in the internal parts of the being of the child, that God is reworking inside of them through the Holy Spirit. And we've gotta trust that and God's timing and our timing are different. Now to me the benefit, if you can see this, if you can kind of readjust expectations and trust that even though we don't always see the kind of development or obedience or striving that maybe we would like to see. I think if we learn to en entrust God with this, we'll find that much of that anxiety. Of guilty mom, guilty dad, often exasperated, especially in today's world with social media, right? Everybody posts a picture of them and their kid on their best day, and we might be looking at it on our worst day. We might be looking at it when you know, we're dealing with temper tantrum or a disobedience or an argument with the team, whatever it is. And, and so this whole thing puts this strange pressure that's not realistic whatsoever. I would wrap it up in a, in, in a couple of stories. One, if you think about the story of Jacob. Right. Multiple wives, uh, the brothers and all their envy and jealousy, Joseph getting sold into slavery. Like if you live next to those people, you're not gonna be sitting there going, man, what a great dad. Uh, I wish our family could be more like that, that that's not what you're going to be thinking. And yet. As messed up as it is, right? God still does the work in Joseph's heart and in in his heart work. Joseph comes to the place in which he's forgiven, and the 12 tribes, the brothers and the entire nation of the Hebrews is saved from the famine. Based on what God has done in the heart and none of it, I'm sure during the growing up and at the moments we read this story, on the train track of reason, on following instructions on the old, set a goal, build a process, achieve an outcome, none of that would be obvious to us. And yet in this dysfunctional family. This, this great ending happens in which, God's work is done in the heart. And so I want to be clear. Yeah. We still have to instruct our kids and we still have to give them. You know, things to follow and rules in our house and expectations that we have for them. But boy, if we can reset, if we can reset this, I think we're going to find ourselves, in less guilt and less frustration and less anxiety. I. I, I've seen it in my own family. I've seen it. I know in myself at times when I was raising kids, I spent a lot of time with grandparents these days. so much of the conversations or around, you know, what the parents and, you know, the son-in-law or the daughter-in-law particularly are doing, and it's all driven by. This trust and reason in human performance in our ability to clearly communicate instructions and motivate like we're some sort of coach and a lack of confidence in the promises of God who says he will come into the child's heart and offer them the inheritance in the kingdom. I invite you and would encourage you to take that under deeper consideration as you, as you run into those special moments where it's like, Hey, didn't I just tell you this? And why would you do all of that? I. There's an old Crosby Stills of Nash song called Teach Your Children Well, and it's kind of an interesting song, but it, it sort of gives, in my view, the wrong advice. It says, don't you ever ask them why, if they told you it would make you cry. So just listen to, to them and sigh and know they love you. Well, it's not too bad, but I think the real advice. The real thing that's gonna take away anxiety isn't not asking the why questions of your kids, or just recognizing that they love their mom and dad, but it's knowing that God loves them and trusting that his love for them will deliver them to the outcome that he has promised. I believe that if you can learn to reset your trust on what God is doing and less trust on what you are doing, if you can come to a place where you put a, put a reasonable expectation on logic and rationalization, if you can get a real estimate of rational capacity of your kids and the unlimited power of God. You are going to find yourself with less anxiety, less mom guilt, less dad guilt, and a more relaxed, just joyous way of raising your family.

Paul (2): 11:16

The ultimate battle for the heart and soul is a fight for identity. Our king invites our kids to know who they are, what to believe, and where they belong. Until next time, let's remember the words for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.