Parenting With Grace
“Why do I need to keep telling you the same thing everyday?”
I asked, sounding quite miffed.
The answer came swiftly:
“Why Do I Need to Keep Telling You Things too?”
All the frustration drained out of me, leaving me feeling sheepish.
That was God asking me the exact same question I was asking my kids.
Why do we expect that God’s Grace will be available to us when we aren’t willing to extend the same measure of Grace to our kids?
We will reduce our constant feeling of frustration and anger towards our kids when they don’t act the way we want them to if we keep the following in mind:
- Kids will always be kids: While it is true that we need our kids to behave certain ways and do certain things, we should also remember that they are kids and they will act their age. And acting their age could mean sometimes forgetting instructions you have given, getting too playful and ignoring some instructions (not to willfully disobey, but just because play time seemed more gratifying at the moment). We need to remember that they will act their age – and sometimes, even act younger than their age.
- They Are Human: Just as parents are not perfect people,just striving towards it, so are kids not perfect. We need to remember this and cut them some slack when they don’t act the way we want them to.
- Your Expectations Should Match Their Capacity: Our expectations for our Kids may just be too high sometimes! We know that we want our kids to be able to master some life skills, but the truth is that it wont happen automatically. The kids will need to grow into the reality of those skills we are trying to pass across to them.
- We all are God’s Work-In-Progress: As a Work-In-Progress, I am not perfect and so I will stumble sometimes. I will not be able to keep up with a facade of having it altogether sometimes. If its fine for me to drop the ball a few times, then it’s okay for my kids to do that also.
We should never forget that we all are a Product of God’s Grace and this same Grace should be extended to our kids.
In what areas do you need to adjust?
I’ll love to read from you. Please don’t leave without letting me know what you think.
Your Fellow Imperfect But Graced Mom,
Wow! This is exactly what I needed to read. AND at the right time! Extending grace to my children and being patient with them, just as God does for us is powerful. Thank you!
Oh Wow! Thank God for always sending His word to us when we need it the most. I am glad you were blessed by this.
Yes I was. Thanks
Thanks for sharing this with us, I learnt a lot, God bless you
I am glad you were blessed by this post. Thank you for stopping by and for taking time to comment. God bless you too.
Your post really hit home for me, because one of my kids is very difficult, and I often lose my patience with him. I must constantly re-assess my approach with him and I must also step back and take a deep breath too. It’s so hard to be a parent sometimes! It’s difficult to know when we are enforcing much-needed discpline and rules, and when we are just being irrational. Your post is has offered me some very clear-cut guidelines. Thanks and God bless!
I am so thankful to God that this post has been such a blessing to you and to your parenting. All of us have some reassessment to do when it comes to parenting, especially for those our lovely strong-willed kids on the way to greatness [You can check out this post I wrote for parenting our strong willed kids here http://strivingnigerianmom.com/2015/04/16/my-strong-willed-child-2/%5D
Thanks so much for your feedback. I really appreciate it.
Thanks so much!
Great reminders 🙂
Thank you!