Wednesday, December 12, 2018
Train children in the right way, and when old, they will not stray. Proverbs 22:6
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My husband and I often struggle with the sheer weight of being a parent in today’s society. We have many conversations in our home about the pressures of society and how that differs from when we were raised.
Sometimes it seems parenting can be a bit like this picture. Lonely and desolate; something beautiful hiding just underneath the surface, but you have to walk through the cold and discomfort to get there. In our society, it can often be isolating to be “that parent” that is the strictest, that parent that limits who their children can be with, that parent that can sometimes be considered a helicopter. It’s a balance, though, I believe. A balance between wanting to shelter your children, and wanting to allow them the space to make some mistakes that they can learn from.
I imagine this is a lot like how God feels about all of us. I believe that if we live a life that pleases God our children are going to learn about the world from our example. How to react, how to love, how to forgive and show God’s grace. How to practice self-control. While I’m certainly enjoying our children at their various stages now, I also look forward to the days when the snow will melt, so to speak, and the fruits of our labor spring forth in them as adults.
Emily Jiancristoforo
mom to Hannah, 11; Carter, 9; Lucy, 7 and Reid, 4