Considering all of the parenting classes I have been through with our MOMS Bible study group over the years, you would think by now I would be pretty close to being the perfect parent. Unfortunately, that is never going to happen. God is the only perfect parent! Yesterday I realized how inadequate my parenting truly is..... what has brought me to my knees you ask? In two words, my daughter. She came to me with friend problems at school. One friend was feeling left out and was retaliating by trying to get a couple more friends to talk ill of my daughter and a couple other friends in their group. The thing she is most upset about is that this group of girls is talking about her behind her back. She says she doesn't care what they are saying, she just wants them to stop. I counseled my daughter in my best mom voice and tried to explain that this friend was feeling hurt and left out, and when we are hurt we often lash out to inflict hurt back. As I dropped her off at school today, I reminded her to be kind and ask herself how God would want her to handle the situations that arise. Driving home I prayed that God would speak to all of their hearts and help them to resolve their conflicts. I also reflected on our Spiritual Parenting book and recalled the author sharing her own friend conflicts in elementary school to her daughter and how she handled it. I remember elementary school, but I cannot recall any specific issues or how I handled them (memory block?), so that isn't going to help. I also told God all of my worries - being afraid after reading about the 12 year old girl that recently committed suicide. Being afraid that my daughter could become the one being bullied, but could also become the one that bullies (a mean girl raises up a mean girl). Once I arrived home, I opened "My Utmost for His Highest" to today's devotion. This is what it said....
The Divine Commandment of Life
"...be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect" Matthew 5:48
Our Lord's exhortation to us is verses 38-48 is to be generous in our behavior toward everyone. Beware of living according to your natural affections in your spiritual life. Everyone has natural affections -- some people we like and others we don't like. Yet we must never let those likes and dislikes rule our Christian life. "If we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another" 1 John 1:7, even those toward whom we have no affection.
The example our Lord gave us here is not that of a good person, or even of a good Christian, but of God Himself. In other words, simply show to the other person what God has shown to you. Being a disciple means deliberately identifying yourself with God's interest in other people. "A new commandment I give you, that you also love one another. By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another" John 13:34-35
The true expression of Christian character is not in good-doing, but in God-likeness. If the Spirit of God has transformed you within, you will exhibit divine characteristics in your life, not just good human characteristics. God's life in us expresses itself as God's life, not as human life trying to be godly. The secret of a Christian's life is that the supernatural becomes natural in him as a result of the grace of God. When we come in contact with things that create confusion and a flurry of activity, we find to our own amazement that we have the power to stay wonderfully poised even in the center of it all.
I will sum all of that by simply sharing a quote
from the Denison Forum email I received this morning:
If you were holding the only flashlight in a dark room,
whose fault would the darkness be?
Today when I pick up my daughter from school I will share with her that I prayed for her and her friends. I will share with her that I read my devotional this morning and that God answered my prayer. I will certainly share with her what God said and I will pray with her and ask God to help us override our human-nature and exhibit more God-nature.
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