“We are not under law, but under grace”. Someone said that to me recently (see Romans 6) and it’s been a great help to me. I say it to myself every time I find myself not living up to my own expectations. I may have great plans for today, but somehow I just don’t get my act together and I can’t get through my list of to-dos. Or I buy something to cook for dinner, but the kids are fussy and I can’t quite get myself into the kitchen to cook it today, with one little one clinging onto my legs and the other one saying incessantly, “Mom, Mom, MOM…”!
I also want to parent by grace, not by law. I don’t want to rule over my children like a tyrant, although I do need them to understand that there are times when they must do as I say. I want to have fun with them and be their friend, as well as their Mom. I want to be able to break my own rules sometimes and not enforce punishment, if I see that they are really having a hard day. I often hear things to the effect, “If you are not consistent with your children, they will not listen to you”. Perhaps, but I tend to think that children will test their boundaries whether you enforce them 90% or 100% of the time (isn’t this their favorite thing to do?)
I hope that I will be humble and kind enough to admit my mistakes to my children and say “sorry” to them if I need to (ouch!) It is often said that children get their ideas about God from what their parents are like. I hope that I can give my children an idea of the kindness and love of God, by the way I treat them, yet at the same time resist the temptation to act as God in their lives. In a mysterious way, they are my “brother and sister in Christ” and they deserve respect as such. May God help me to be the parent He wants me to be, but also to remember, when I make mistakes, that I am “not under law, but grace”.