The Mirror Called Parenting
By Mr Danny Chua
Over this weekend, a good number of our members, parents and grandparents, children’s teachers and ministry workers alike are gathering for one purpose. We are thinking of the next generation – why the discipleship of our children (biological and otherwise) in the home and in the local church is a gospel mission priority.
As we do so, I find myself taking a step back to process my own journey as a Christian parent. God has been immensely kind, and I’ve had the privilege of being a father for the past 4 years!
With each passing year, I’ve come to see how parenting is a little like looking in the mirror. When we look into this mirror, we see sin. I’m referring here to my own sin, and the weaknesses of my own flesh.
These are the kinds of things we have been reflecting over for months in the letter to the Romans. What does it mean for me in my role as a father, to “let not sin therefore reign in my mortal body” and to “present myself to God… and my members to Him as instruments for righteousness?” (Romans 6:12-14) How does being dead to sin and alive with Christ (Romans 6:4) guide my parenting instincts?
In reality, the first thing this mirror of parenting reveals to me is the many sinful mindsets ingrained in me. I can think of the ways I quickly grow impatient when I interact with my daughters – often, the underlying reason is my own selfishness and desire for control, for everything around me to go my way (and not their messy way!). It is all too easy to let the deceiving power of sin overtake me in such situations.
I can recall the multiple times a week I feel an angry storm slowly brewing in my heart when the kids disobey – deep inside, I think “we’ve talked about these rules before, why are you breaking them again?!”
Sometimes, it is just so tempting to forget the gravity of sin in our lives, and in our children’s lives. Often, it feels much safer to put my trust in ‘law’-shaped parenting, believing that dishing out some rules (even God’s good commands from Scripture) will produce an obedient heart in these little lives.
The mirror of parenting… It shows me how much I underestimate the monster of sin. Instead, the sin in us, and our children, can always feel a step ahead, “seizing an opportunity” to deceive and destroy (Romans 7:13-20).
In such moments, where the sin in me and the sin in my children seem so impossibly heavy… The sense of death, condemnation, and guilt can feel so overwhelming. This is why, each week, my wife and I try to remember to pray this prayer and utter this cry to our Father:
“Lord, we need your Spirit’s help as parents, help us not do this in the power of our flesh, help us not crush our children with the weight of the ‘law’, but help us by your Spirit to shepherd them to the only One who can change their hearts of sin, and the only One who can give them a new Spirit to obey you from the inside.”
As Paul promises us in Romans: “For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.” (8:13). May our God grant us all the help we need through His Spirit of life – for we desperately need Him daily!!
