Not My Job, But Yours Be Done

I'm beginning to realize why my older friends didn't talk much about raising teenagers. {And you may remember when I said the same thing about middle schoolers….} There are times when I've been like, "Why didn't so and so TELL ME?"  "Why didn't they sit me down and fill me in on the best ways to handle these little budding adults that have shown up on the second floor of my home?" "Why didn't they tell me that I would feel so ill-equipped and confused much of the time?"  Here's the reason they didn't tell me— because they knew I really wouldn't be able to understand it until I got there.  Here.  Wherever. They knew they could tell me, warn me, encourage me in some specific areas but that I really wouldn't— couldn't— take it to heart because I had no way of knowing what raising teenagers would be like.

Until I was actually doing it.

Life with teenagers can be great.  On good days, we can teeter on the "friendship" side of parenting— seeing glimpses of what our adult relationship might look like, we can actually agree on a life issue, we can have some meaningful interactions on close to the heart subjects, and we can think, "Hey— I really like you."  And SOMETIMES life with teenagers can feel like a bubble blown from dollar store mix— it’s fragile and one more breath in the plastic wand and it bursts.  A good ol' "bust" just may be the better term.  And these "busts" leave you wondering if things will ever be light and normal again……if hormones will ever run on cruise control again…if anyone will ever smile in our house again…if coat hangers will ever be used for hanging clothes again.  You know- dire issues like that.  Anyone with teenagers knows what I am talking about— with the bubble— you ask a simple question, like, "Have much homework?" and there are tears followed by questions of why you don't love them anymore and life is NOT normal.  Or light.  *

And you are dumbfounded.  Homework vs. their place in your heart.  The game has changed.  The stakes are higher.  Fo sho.

Look at all of them!  If not a teenager already, look how many just a few friends have to raise!!  Love. These. Kids.

Having a few more years behind us, we think we know what's best for them—and most of the time we do, but they simply can't see it.  OR they see it fine, but wouldn't even pretend they did.  A few things fall into that category these days— things I'd love to see them doing but they just haven't owned yet.  I DO know these particular things ARE best for them so I pray.  And pray some more— praying that God will do the things that only He can do.  Remember Blackaby's Experiencing God in the 90's?  I picked it back up again after 20 years and guess what?  It's STILL amazing.  And I loved being reminded of these things— the things ONLY HE can do.  {See?  If only HE can do them, then it's struck OFF my list. I don't know about you, but I am all up for that.}

1.  Draws people to Himself
2.  Causes people to seek Him
3.  Reveals spiritual Truth
4.  Convicts the world {us, our children and everyone we know!} of guilt about sin, righteousness and judgment

How freeing is that?  Those are His jobs, not mine.  I take huge comfort in that and the really incredible thing is that He is faithful and I am counting on Him to do His part. And you can bet I will remind Him of it— respectfully.  Of course.   When will I respectfully remind Him?  Every time I try to think of a creative way to get them to read Scripture on their own.  Every time I want pure repentance— like some sackcloth and ashes action.  GRIEF over their sin.  Every time I see them struggling with a spiritual Truth after I've laid it out as clearly as I know how.  That's when I have to remind Him that drawing, revealing and convicting is HIS job.  Not mine.  I am not in control.  I have none.

Are you detecting the focus here?  Are you sensing who this parenting thing is really about?    So a few months after I began reading Experiencing God again— enter Paul David Tripp's book Parenting.  It IS about parenting but as I read it, it is so much more about the work needed in my own heart.  Just like marriage, parenting is just another degree of our sanctification, another prying off of our fingers from our own desires and agendas, another microscope on the sin that is still active in my own life.  So don't read it if you don't want to be thoroughly challenged— BUT, know this, it's not a burdensome book.  AT ALL.  It frees you— just as Henry Blackaby's principles from Scripture do.  There are just certain things we were never meant to do.  We can encourage it. We can teach it.  We can model it.  But we cannot make them choose it for themselves.  It's only by God's grace that I chose Him all those years ago.
 

So, these days, I am more convinced than ever that parenting is really about the work He wants to accomplish in me— letting go of my desire for control, comfort, "rightness", and even peace.  He wants me completely aware of what’s ruling my own heart, my absolute dependency on Him, my perpetual need for Him— and how that kind of dependence looks moment to moment.

And yes, I am still figuring that out.  Parenting moments are hardly EVER planned.  Friends, we've got to be at the ready.  I think His Word has a few things to say about that.  So maybe we can talk about that another time?  Until we can do that here’s some favorite verses.

2 Peter 1:3 His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 4Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.

5For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; 6and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; 7and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love. 8For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Wow.  So be it.

{Here's the link to what my friend wrote several months ago now regarding Tripp's book— and a bit of her parenting experience.  Don't we all learn so much from each other?  Grateful for community within the Body of Christ.}

{* Instead of “Have much homework?”--- “What did you do last night?” or “How was the party?” or “Why did you miss curfew?” or “What is this text all about?”  In these years there could be things that happen that tear holes in our hearts-- this is a burst bubble of a different caliber-- so just know those things are tumbling around in my mind as I write this.}