Sunday, November 9, 2008

God and Me 19-Apart from the vine, I am nothing

D and I both want to parent from a Biblical standpoint but we weren't exactly sure how to do that. D was raised in a family that were occasional church goers with little emphasis placed on spiritual growth. My family was active in church my whole life with much of my childhood centered around church. Both of our families were very good at teaching right vs. wrong. My family also focused on God as a force in your life. And up until now, I probably would have said that was what Biblical parenting was all about.

Recently, I've read The Mission of Motherhood and The Ministry of Motherhood, by Sally Clarkson, both of which have given me a new perspective on Biblical parenting. These two books, along with a blog two adoptive parents have written on attachment issues, have really helped me to see real life examples of Biblical parenting. (Thanks, Cate and Dawn!) Some big ideas that I've walked away with are using Scripture as a parenting tool and letting the Holy Spirit be at work in your parenting.

In the last month or so, I've seen multiple examples on using Scripture as a talking point when dealing with both good and bad behavior. So once Kenson arrives, we're going to really work on using the Galatians 5 Fruits of the Spirit as our key Scripture as we parent, with our discipline and interactions with our kids and each other flowing out of those 2 verses. I know the concepts of love, joy, peace, patience, etc. are abstract but I truly believe that young children learn abstract concepts by exposure to them and then examples of those concepts. Plus I know D and I will benefit from focusing our relationship on these fruits as well.

God has also been really working on me in the area of letting the Holy Spirit work in my life, to let my independent spirit rest and to let the Spirit of God be at work. For me personally it means not being a know it all. Those of you who have seen me at my worst know that I can come off that way, often unintentionally. I am afraid that I have spent much of my lifetime thus far being a know it all with God. Many things come easy for me and it's so easy to just chalk that up to my own ability to do certain tasks. In fact, admitting that I'm at a loss as to what to do or that I need someone to help me are not things I like to do. I usually walk away from situations like that feeling like a complete failure and replaying the situation to try to fix what went wrong. I know I will approach parenting the same way. I know that I ask God for advice and guidance as a last resort not as a first step. And I know that I have a tendancy to want to be perfect and not make any mistakes, especially when parenting. God wants to relieve me of the pressure of perfection and the burden of discouragement by giving me His Spirit.

I want my parenting to be Spirit driven because I believe that who I am as a parent teaches my children about who God is as a Father. And I want to embrace the times of frustration and discouragement in parenting rather than get frustrated or angry over those times. I want to not be hyper critical of myself and enjoy the experience, warts and all. I believe that those not fun, Mama's a little cranky and worn out times are the times where God can lead me the most, if I'll let Him. Those weak areas are opportunities for me to recognize how it is always God at work in me that enables me to be successful. I need to see that my successes are only successes because of God, that apart from the vine, I am nothing. I need to see that I am not a failure when I don't know what to do next but that I am a human who is woefully misguided most of the time.

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