For
many of us, parenting is the last remaining frontier in which our anger has not
been fully tamed. We’ve beaten anger back off the shores of friendship and even
the wide plains of marriage, but it remains entrenched in the wild, untamed
hill country of parenting. We don’t like it, don’t want to admit it, and even
feel downright ashamed about it, but nevertheless, anger remains in our words
and our actions toward our kids.
Some parents among us grew up facing
anger from their parents, and they swore up and down that they would not repeat
those sins once their chance to be a parent came along. Yet here they stand with
a bewildered look on their face as they have to admit once again, “I sound just
like my dad (or mom).” It’s like the struggle that the Apostle Paul described
in Romans 7:15—“I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I
want, but I do the very thing I hate.”
Why do we find such anger boiling up
within us? Biblically, the answer is pretty simple—our hearts tell us that we
deserve to be treated like God Himself, but our kids have different ideas.
Please note: it is not that our kids make us get angry. They don’t have
any such control over our actions. Rather, they simply act in ways we don’t
like and we choose to react in anger. Our anger is always our own fault,
not theirs. We have to accept responsibility before there will be any hope of
change.
How do we start to defeat this anger
in our hearts? The process is not easy, but I believe it begins with this
realization: anger cannot and will not produce any good results in our
relationships with our children. None. Zero. As long as we entertain any
thought that our anger might produce something good, we will lack the
determination to put our anger to death. It’ll become like that can of random
screws in your garage—you hang on to them because maybe, just maybe, they’ll
come in handy someday. If you treat anger that way, you’ll be surprised just how
often you pull it down off the shelf.
Why am I so confident that anger
will produce no good thing in your relationship with your kids? Take a look at
James 1:19-20: “Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to
hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; for the anger of man does not produce the
righteousness of God.” That last statement is true both in me and in others. My
anger doesn’t lead me toward godliness, and it doesn’t produce godliness in
others, either.
At least not true
godliness—the kind that flows from the heart. Anger can be so deceptive in this
way because it can produce an imitation of godliness. Our kids tend to shape up
after we’ve unleashed a verbal barrage on them. It looks like it accomplished
something, so we’re tempted to keep doing it. But “shaping up” shouldn’t be our
goal as Christian parents. Cleaned-up behavior on the outside with dirty hearts
on the inside isn’t what we’re aiming for. The grand, audacious, mind-blowing
goal of this thing we call parenting is to lead our children to love God with
everything they’ve got and to love others like they love themselves. Anger will
not move us one inch closer toward that goal, though it might knock us backward
by several yards.
Now, we can all thank God that He so
often accomplishes great work in our children’s hearts in spite of our
anger. That is glory to Him, but it is no credit to us. We don’t want to use
His kindness as some excuse to not get serious about putting our anger to
death. While this isn’t the whole answer, the process at least starts in us
when we look in the mirror and say, “I don’t have this all figured out, and I
may not know yet what I’m going to do instead, but whatever it is, I will not
speak or act in anger toward my kids again.” Will we still blow it at times?
Probably, but praise God that the repentant heart will always find forgiveness
through Christ! A humble confession to our kids will also do worlds of good—for
them and for us. Time to stop reading and go find that mirror!
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