This question came from, anonymous grandma.  She wants to know, “Why do some children always have to learn the hard way?”  (thanks mom)

Response: 

I remember once visiting a family and having dinner with them in their home.  They had a two year old who was just about to outgrow his highchair.  They tried to put him in the chair which amounted to maneuvering his legs by bending them and turning them to squeeze them between the chair seat and the top.  If you have ever tried to accomplish this with a willing child you know just how difficult it can be.  The child, for his part stiffened and stretched his legs trying to make them as long and straight as possible thus not enabling his mommy to get him seated.  Eventually mom after much prying, wedging, screaming and shouting finally got the kid into the highchair.  The kid also sensing his mom and dad’s shear embarrassment from having their pastor be a witness to this, went on to throw his food, spill his sippy cup and interrupt at every opportune moment.  Note to any of you preparing to become pastors, do your best not to laugh and never see this as a teachable moment.

I guess you could just chalk this up to the terrible two’s.  Or, you could blame your spouse or their inferior gene pool.  Or, you could read a good parenting book and realize that the child is navigating a bit of an identity crisis.   I prefer the explanation from a the folks at “Parenting with Love and Logic.”  They explain it as the first shot at the shift from the child’s identity being in-distinguishable from their parents to the child’s seeing themselves apart from their parents. This is a movement from complete dependance to complete independence.  This journey, takes as long as it takes.  Sometimes this first shot at it begins and ends rather quickly by age 3 or sometimes is lasts well into adulthood.

The second or maybe third shot on this journey we could call, “Control to Freedom.”  Have you every tried to tell a teenager how to wear their hair?  Good Luck.  Some parents do.  They understand their job as trying to control their kids.  First they try to reason with the kid, when that doesn’t work they up the anti to light nagging and then outright yelling.  If that doesn’t work they increase the volume and may even mix in a, “YOUR GROUNDED.”  Now the child goes to their room and slams the door and says to themselves, you watch I will get a hair cut that they really won’t like.

You can imagine how difficult it can be for people who have not successfully navigated this journey from, “Control to Freedom” to learn anything at all.  The freedom to make their own choices, even really bad ones, continues to be more important than making choices that their parents would approve of.   

This Sunday I am preaching on the Tenth chapter of John. Jesus sets out a different kind of relationship in this parable.  Notice the verbs here in this excerpt where Jesus says, 

“The Shepherd calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.”

The good shepherd leads and calls instead of controls and nags.  Think about how different that is.  I grew up believing that God was more of a judge who coerces, threatens and  punishes, Who was obsessed with wether or not I was going to obey.  Now I see God differently and it has made all the difference   What would life be like if we instead saw God as a good shepherd who calls us by name and leads us out.

Now I realize that sheep don’t have highchairs and that parenting is hard even on the best of days. I just wonder  if parents were better at leading and calling their children, the children would have less difficulty learning things the easy way.