Freedom and Love {My Philosophy of Motherhood}
*love*
Do I enjoy mothering?
Or do I merely survive each day, as though the reward were in the finish line rather than the race itself?
***
If I’m being totally honest, the deepest longing of my heart in this whole mothering thing is that I want to be delighted by my children, and our journey together. As we travel on this winding road, I want to feel the sun beating down on my shoulders, the wind blowing my hair, and soft earth under my feet. And when it’s stormy or cloudy or cold I want to get cozy together by drawing near to each other for comfort, even as other forces try to tear us apart.
So often the mama crowd falls into the endless hole of angst and fussiness, as though it were The True Test of Survival to endure the little years and emerge more or less unscathed. There’s a time and a place for expressing gritty and raw emotion bled forth from our deepest longings and humanity, but after the cathartic emptying there’s a choice to be made about how to fill ourselves back up. What framework do I set before myself?
The question at hand is what is my practice of mothering? What do I try to do to enjoy it more? I do one thing, and it is simply this: to remind myself that I am free.
I’m set free.
From heavy and costly expectations and checkboxes and behavioural standards. From the need to raise a well-behaved child. From the idea that obedience is more important than their hearts. From the old laws that Jesus came to satisfy.
Freedom to try to parent my children as my God parents me.
{With grace and freedom and love}.
And here’s why…
I believe that obedience and compliance are inferior goals in parenting, and that when those goals are achieved by means of punishment and fear that we are actually hindering our children’s understanding of the kingdom of heaven.
How does this parenting thing generally go in our culture (especially in “Christian culture”)? The typical goal is to raise children that are obedient so that they learn to obey God. How is this achieved? Generally through fear and punishment. The threat of punishment (whether it’s spanking, loss of privileges, time-outs, or something else altogether) is imminent at all times if the child disobeys enough to “warrant” it. This is generally an effective deterrent to misbehaviour, and children grow up compliant and obedient.
The problem is that God does not parent us this way.
How does the Bible describe how God relates to His children? It says that God has made a New Covenant with us. When God spoke these words through the prophet Jeremiah, Israel had a culture of external control. God related to the people through external forces such as the pillar of cloud, and leprosy and stoning as consequences for sin. There were priests and temples and sacrifices – all ways to relate to God externally.
“Now in the external governing system, the motivating force in the relationship with God came in the form of blessings for obedience and threats of punishment… If the threat of punishment were to be removed, God’s people would lapse into another season of rebellion against Him… Unfortunately, many of us… continue to raise our children according to an Old Testament paradigm. It is still common… to believe that mistakes or sin must be punished. The parenting model that flows from this paradigm presents a “punisher” role for the parent and creates an “outside-in” approach to learning about life for the child.” (D. Silk, “Loving Our Kids on Purpose”).
In our culture now, God relates to His children from the inside. His Holy Spirit is our conscience and guide, and we no longer have external controls to ensure obedience. Christ came as the final sacrifice, and took the punishment upon himself. We are set free to make a choice without the threat of punishment. He gives grace upon grace, and when we mess up yet again he simply lavishes love upon us richly and gently guides us back to the right way.
This is the kind of parent I want to be.
The kingdom of God does not operate based on control. God doesn’t want a fearful Pharisaical rule-follower who doesn’t know love. He wants us to learn to walk in freedom, not bondage. To freely choose to love him, and to revel in that choice. To spin around with outstretched arms, feeling the wind on our faces and the sweetness of freely choosing love. To organically learn the natural consequences for our sin and to understand that His ways are so much better, and then to freely choose Him in love. To know the sorrow of freely choosing something other than Him, and the joyful repentance and restoration that comes from His incredible grace.
This is the kind of parent I want to be.
I want to remember that I am free, and to teach this truth to my children. To tell them that they too are free. To make sinful choices and to reap the sorrow that comes from separation. To freely choose love and obedience because it is better, not because it is mandated. Through the power of Christ we are free. May I always model in my parenting the freedom and love of God’s kingdom so that they know…
We’re set free.
***
This outpouring of my heart is inspired by The Practices of Parenting Carnival, hosted by Sarah at Emerging Mummy. Check out her blog on Monday, February 6th, for a fantastic collection of posts on this same topic, and consider joining in with your own thoughts!
I love your emphasis on freedom and not having the emphasis being on control. Tyranny and control sometimes works at certain ages, but can set us up for a fall with our children later.
Beth, yes. YES.
Why would we want to parent any other way than the way Jesus parents us? And if that’s the case, then so many people have a messed-up view of what He’s like. That makes me so, so sad.
As a mom of a young toddler (and baby) I’m constantly asking myself “how would Jesus respond if _____?” (fill-in-the-blank: Levi was pushing his buttons? not listening? throwing a tantrum? refusing a diaper change? screaming while the baby sleeps? etc etc etc!) It can be hard in the moment to know how to answer those questions, but I know that Jesus would always respond with tenderness and respect. Perhaps he would sometimes be firm, but his firmness would ALWAYS be tempered with gentleness and grace. Children, we must remember that our children are CHILDREN. They need grace as much as we do.
I agree – I don’t know why you *wouldn’t* want to parent as Jesus does… that just doesn’t make sense. And I agree – he would always respond with tenderness and respect. Sometimes firmness, too. I keep having The Sound of Music run through my head here – where Maria is enroute to the Von Trapps for the first time, and she sings “…I will be firm, but kind!…”
I was really inspired by the reminder that God parents us – I wrote a post about it because it would have been RIDICULOUS as a comment, but thanks for the inspiration, and as always I love seeing the best of your heart for your kids!
http://movingwithgod.blogspot.com/2012/02/gods-parenting-and-punishment.html
Interesting Alyssa! Thanks for sharing your thoughts. That’s a fascinating discussion when you get into the original text of words like punishment, etc. I did a word study on “the rod” in relation to spanking, and found it quite interesting as well.
Wow. This is really inspiring Beth. To parent in the knowledge we are free and lavish the grace and love that’s been shown to us. That is a great call to parenting. Thanks.
Thank-you for your kind words! I appreciate them!
Ah, lovely.
I’m with you on this one, but had never sat down and really applied the theology to it, so thanks. I’m actually sort of looking forward to my next “Just make her stay in Sunday School! We don’t mind the screaming. She has to learn that she doesn’t control things.” response. Maybe I’ll be able to open up some peaceful dialogue instead of hanging my head and feeling ashamed while also knowing that making my kid sit alone and morosely crying for an hour is nowhere near my list of “things to do as a parent”.
Would love to hear your practical application too…
Oh goodness, I very strongly dislike the whole forcing them to stay in sunday school thing when they are crying and panicking and freaking out. What they need (in my opinion!) is the reassurance that they will not be forced into situations in which they are highly uncomfortable, until they are secure and ready to do so of their own accord.
Just posted some of my practical application tools…
This is so beautiful. So beautiful. Thank you for writing it. It captures so beautifully my heart and how I want to parent.
Thank-you for your kind & encouraging words – they are life to me!
Chills, Beth. Absolute CHILLS. This so captures my own heart. Thank you!
Oh that is thrilling to me, Sarah! I’m glad that you *get it* (I kinda suspected you would!). xoxo!
Wow! Wow! Wow! If you were in the room as I was reading you would have heard me say AMEN! after almost every sentence. Preach it sister!
“…but after the cathartic emptying there’s a choice to be made about how to fill ourselves back up.” I hope this question rocks the ‘mommy blogosphere’ – which seems to so often stop at the cathartic emptying.. Oh I can’t say enough how much I love this!
I ask myself all the time if I’m parenting my daughter the way God parents me. I feel like I’ve found a virtual kindred spirit in you! Added you to my reader, and I can’t wait to read more from you!
Thank you so much for sharing this and participating in the carnival!
Woohoo! I just LOVE knowing that what I’ve said really resonated with someone… really that’s why I write, so thank-you for sharing your response with me! I feel that bit deeply too – the choice about what to fill myself with… it’s one that I take too lightly sometimes, but one that makes all the difference in the world. Thanks again
It is so inspiring and moving to read such a beautifully-crafted and thoughtful theological reflection on parenting! Thank you so much for sharing.
Thank-you for reading and commenting, it means a lot to me!
Amen, amen, amen. WHY is our Christian culture so inundated with the idea of outward obedience? I love that you are set free from that. I try so hard to keep that at the forefront of my parenting too. Their hearts are so much more important than anyone’s expectations on their behavior and my parenting! Thanks for a great post!
I really don’t understand it. I mean, sure it would be convenient to have children that behaved perfectly all the time, but gracious, how boring and sad would that be? I’ll take my spirited kiddos any day! Their little hearts are so beautifully wild, and I hope to channel them, not squash them.
I love this post, and I relate so much to your parenting philosophy. I often struggle with the issues of discipline and spanking. I often ask myself, when parenting my soon-to-be two year old, “is this how God would deal with me? Am I representing Jesus to this little boy so that he will grow to know and desire to serve Him?” I guess my question is what does your parenting look like, practically speaking? How do you correct and teach in the way you’re talking about? What are some books or other resources that could give me an alternative to spanking because soooooo much Christian teaching goes in this direction.
Thanks Lindsey, that’s a really great question, and I think I should probably just write a post about it… the practical side of things. I like to get the philosophical framework down, and then get specific with the practical stuff from there… so a practical follow-up post is a great idea. The book I quoted is a great one if you’d like to check it out. “Loving Our Kids on Purpose” by Danny Silk.