Faulty thinking

Ah, how easily we fall into cause-and-effect thinking, you know, the kind of thinking that goes like: "If I do all the right things, it will turn out okay." It works for some things, but that kind of thinking gets to be very unhelpful when it overflows into things like illness, relationship breakdown, employment loss, and other aspects of our imperfect lives in this imperfect world. Of course you can cause breakdowns in these areas, but there is a surprising amount of stuff that you simply can't control by "being good". Yet we still act as though we can.

Getting some perspective

I've seen parents going out of their minds trying to do a perfect job of parenting. From prior to conception, potential parents are bombarded with "rules" as to how to be the perfect parent. I saw a reel the other day telling me that I should have played a special soothing song to my sons before they were born . . . that we would have had a better time with them as newborns! 

We're told that during the school years to make sure they have plenty of exercise, or to learn an instrument or a language, or to have lots of down time, or to read to them often. And it's implied that they should have perfect behaviour at school and excellent school results, that we need to make sure they've got all their homework done on time and ensure they have time with friends too, not to mention a perfect diet.

Parents are told to develop family traditions and give our kids the best examples. Christian families have a lot of expectations on them too, from family and personal devotions, to church and Youth Group attendance. And of course this isn't new.

Some of our motivation is most likely fuelled by the thought: I will be blessed if I do this. Such is the strength of the myth: "bad things don't happen to good people". And therefore I have to do all in my power to be the best person I can be. And when you're a parent, that puts an awful amount of pressure on you, especially if things go wrong. Sadly many Christian parenting books seem to champion this flawed thinking and seem to completely forget about God's grace. 

When bad things happen, the logical conclusion when you're thinking this way is that "it's my fault" or you start looking around for someone else to blame. But that isn't always the case. How often do we look at others struggling with their children in public and silently judge them, wondering what they did to deserve such misery. And how miserable people are when their kids go off in directions their parents don't want them to or don't take the "expected path". 

So many expectations and so much misery.

People in more prominent positions, like pastors and missionaries suffer too, and possibly more. The expectations seem higher when there are a lot of people watching you.

My husband and I are watching the fifth season of The Crown. It's a historical-fiction series about British royal family and they're currently covering the 1990s, when the family suffered a number of marriage breakdowns, as well as other hardships. The Queen actually publicly described 1992 as her "annus horribilis." We can barely imagine what it's like to live such a high profile life, but you can see the same pattern: perfection is aimed at, failed to be achieved, and people feel the need to blame. A cause-and-effect thought pattern that works well in some aspects of our world, but not so well in others.

Over the last few years we've personally been in a season of "walking beside" our older teens/young adults as they go through difficult times. It's been hard, and we've had to let go of our expectations (many we didn't realise we even had) and seek to find ways to love them unconditionally as well as encourage them.

Those of us who follow the God of the Bible need to be careful. We have a tendency to try to do deals with God: if I'm good, you have to bless me with a hardship-free life. Even if we don't think we think that way, it can so easily slip in. For example, thinking: if I pray hard about something God will have to do something good. If I get parenting right, then my kids will turn out right (turning Proverbs 22:6 into a promise instead of just wise advice: "Train up a child in the way they should go, and when they are old they will not depart from it.")

I was encouraged by a sermon I listened to the other day. The preacher, who has gone through plenty of hardship himself said: "The good news is that you cannot be bad enough to ensure God's condemnation of your family." And "the bad news is that you cannot be good enough to ensure God's blessing on your family . . . the future of your family, for good or ill, is in the hands of God." He finished by asking: What hope is there? Turn to the One who holds the future in his hands and ask him to honour himself through your family. God uses our messes: just look at Jesus' genealogy, it's full of broken families!

This is not an encouragement to be slack, but rather an encouragement to cut yourself some slack. Things will go wrong, when they do, it's not necessarily your fault. And the same for how you quietly think about those around you. 

I've struggled to get my thoughts down on this topic and press Publish. But I hope that it's as helpful to you as it's been to me to think about these things.