So I just finished putting the kids to bed. And for the second night in a row, what you pictured to be a Hallmark moment before you have kids was anything but. Each night a different kid chose to be cranky, cantankerous, ornery and down-right difficult.
Before I had kids, I never knew that a human being could swing from near-rage-level frustration to warm, affectionate, tender love in the span of approximately 9.5 seconds. Kids do that to you.
One of the things that I've had to contend with in both marriage and with my kids is allowing the overly-romanticized hopes and pictures of what it will be like to burn off without that producing bitterness. Bed time "should be" this sweet, cuddly, fun time with the kids. Sometimes it is. Sometimes it's the worst time of the day.
Faced with this, I have a couple of options.
I could let reality shatter my romantic illusions and be bitter about it. This has all kinds of unpleasant circumstances--one of them being that I end up despising my kids in my heart for not living up to my expectations of them, for not delivering what I need/want/thought they were supposed to deliver. This is equally or even more toxic when we take this route in marriage.
Or I could live in denial about reality and continue to try to massage/force these kids and my life to fit the over-idealized mold I want them to fit into. The consequence here is that I never actually love my kids for who they are. I love the illusion more than I love the actual human beings given to me by God to love. Again, some folks opt for this in marriage. Not so good.
Lastly, I can allow my illusions to pass but do so with humility and even expectation. Only as I die to my pictures of what my marriage or family life could or should be can I then learn to actually love my wife and children for who they are.
In other words, the economy of the gospel is always that life comes from death. Jesus lives this out and invites us to follow in his steps.
Putting to death my own dreams or expectations in order to allow something new to take root is what it means to follow Jesus in just about every area of life. So it is with our most precious and important relationships.
This does not mean that I do not have goals or hopes for how we might grow or what the Lord might do in my marriage or with my kids. But these hopes and prayers for our future together are rooted in the realities of who each one of us actually is, not what my culture or Christian sub-culture would prefer me to look like.
I'm still learning how to lean into that third option. And sometimes when my kids push me to the limits of my patience I can't say that I'm exactly forward thinking in concert with God and the angelic beings he's given me to parent.
But I'm learning, even tonight, to discipline and pray and dream and hope while allowing some expectations to die--with great hope that just as Jesus was raised in a perfected body, so, too, will my own images and expectations and hopes for my family.
But I don't think Hallmark has a card that says all of that.
Before I had kids, I never knew that a human being could swing from near-rage-level frustration to warm, affectionate, tender love in the span of approximately 9.5 seconds. Kids do that to you.
One of the things that I've had to contend with in both marriage and with my kids is allowing the overly-romanticized hopes and pictures of what it will be like to burn off without that producing bitterness. Bed time "should be" this sweet, cuddly, fun time with the kids. Sometimes it is. Sometimes it's the worst time of the day.
Faced with this, I have a couple of options.
I could let reality shatter my romantic illusions and be bitter about it. This has all kinds of unpleasant circumstances--one of them being that I end up despising my kids in my heart for not living up to my expectations of them, for not delivering what I need/want/thought they were supposed to deliver. This is equally or even more toxic when we take this route in marriage.
Or I could live in denial about reality and continue to try to massage/force these kids and my life to fit the over-idealized mold I want them to fit into. The consequence here is that I never actually love my kids for who they are. I love the illusion more than I love the actual human beings given to me by God to love. Again, some folks opt for this in marriage. Not so good.
Lastly, I can allow my illusions to pass but do so with humility and even expectation. Only as I die to my pictures of what my marriage or family life could or should be can I then learn to actually love my wife and children for who they are.
In other words, the economy of the gospel is always that life comes from death. Jesus lives this out and invites us to follow in his steps.
Putting to death my own dreams or expectations in order to allow something new to take root is what it means to follow Jesus in just about every area of life. So it is with our most precious and important relationships.
This does not mean that I do not have goals or hopes for how we might grow or what the Lord might do in my marriage or with my kids. But these hopes and prayers for our future together are rooted in the realities of who each one of us actually is, not what my culture or Christian sub-culture would prefer me to look like.
I'm still learning how to lean into that third option. And sometimes when my kids push me to the limits of my patience I can't say that I'm exactly forward thinking in concert with God and the angelic beings he's given me to parent.
But I'm learning, even tonight, to discipline and pray and dream and hope while allowing some expectations to die--with great hope that just as Jesus was raised in a perfected body, so, too, will my own images and expectations and hopes for my family.
But I don't think Hallmark has a card that says all of that.
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