Parents! Our painful experiences in this world with our children are not meant to break us! God can use those events to help us know him better. They are also not designed to be the lenses that you see God as a divine oligarch but a kind and loving father. As children of God we should allow His words not our experiences teach us about God. His ways our higher than our ways. We show the children in our lives that the God is a loving parent and Bible is real by how we correct them. Do not allow your parenting to be driven by your emotions.
A.W. Tower in his awesome book “The Knowledge of Holy”, reminds us that an important part of emotional perspective of how the world of parenting works is what we think about God. How we view “God” is the most important “thought” in our minds because it affects everything we say to children. It affects our perception of right and wrong, the way we treat teenagers when they get bad grades, and the way we think about ourselves when we fail God as adults. Many parents in our society today claim to believe in God do so without letting His word truly affect their lives at home with their children. That’s the easy route-- to claim belief, but never let your heart truly be transformed when dealing with a rebellious child. The unfortunate thing is that this happens due to the fact that we allow our beliefs to be shaped more by our life experiences than the words in the Bible. It's important to be aware of this and be intentional about not falling into that pattern. Do not let your experiences shape your belief about God because that shapes the condition of your heart towards your children.
Do not allow our culture to teach you theology or how to parent your child. Allowing popular culture to lead you in parenting your child will never end well. Letting our experiences as adults in this godless culture set the tone of our theology and parenting for us is not the proper order of things. We live in a society today that is angrier than ever. Cursing at our children will not help them. Aggression, defensiveness, and cruelty is becoming more and more normal. In an article published last year by The Wall Street Journal, the author regarded the current culture of America as a “culture of outrage!”. It's imperative that those of us who are parents and mentor teenagers especially those who know the Prince of Peace stand against allowing experiences in this fallen world mold us into brittle, bitter, or broken people. That’s easier said than done when dealing with stubborn teenagers, but if you rely on God’s strength wholeheartedly and have the right perception of Him it is possible!
Our God wants us to rely on him. He is not a impatient unempathic father who is too busy to answer us. He is not like our imperfect earthly fathers who’s anger can be unpredictable. The God of the Bible is different. Yes! God does get angry, but He is not constantly in a spirit of anger. He revealed himself in Jesus so we would not experience His wrath. God is not forever angry or indefinitely outraged at sinners. He is frustrated towards our proclivity to rush toward sin instead of Him. We often do no allow the promptings of the Holy Spirit inside of us to direct our steps away from sin. However, because God is love, He has graciously provided a way to deliver us from participating in the culture of outrage, that way being Jesus! As residents of Chicago we have a chance to share this message with our neighbors.
Below are 3 ways as parent who is a Christian to respond to outrage based on what we know about God!
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Speak words of kindness to your children that bring the light to the darkness of their depression:. We are called to be the light of the world and in our homes. We can't be a light with our words if we speak words that hurt all the time. We can shine the light of forgiveness with words of kindness in daily conversation with our children during our interpersonal conflicts.
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Communicate with grace and truth in all conversations. Nobody in America especially your children expects you to be gracious and kind when they disagree with you, as Christians we need to have that surprise factor and operate in love no matter what. Be quick to listen to your teenagers! with graciousness and speak with wisdom and discernment. Leading by example is what we are called to do as believers who are serving as representatives for God. It is more important than ever to be gracious.
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Learn more about God than focusing on this world. Our culture questions the authority of Bible constantly. Most people we know don't want to hear what the Bible says about marriage, singleness or raising children. Our job is not to change that mindset, but to model for them what it means to be an adult Christian. Most people will not listen to the word of God being preached, but they will watch how the people of God act. The most powerful way to communicate the essence of the gospel will be how you respond to your life when things are not going well.
My hope is that as a church, we will not allow our culture to define our walk with God. My prayer as we continue this sermon series on Knowing God is that we will allow our Saviour to shape our hearts and that we would overflow on grace and truth rather than with outrage.
Respectfully,
Pastor James Owolabi
