One Spring me and my buddies had a “great” idea.
The house on the corner had four large bushes with huge, pure white mums. We discovered that if you slammed one of these mums with a baseball bat it would make the coolest explosion – white pedals flew everywhere! To make it more challenging you had to accomplish this feat while riding at full speed on your bicycle.
It was a blast – speeding down the alley, swinging bats and exploding flowers. Until the lady of the house appeared screaming “words I never heard in the Bible”.
We all scattered but were totally bewildered that she was so upset … over some flowers?
It’s easy to view our children as little adults. But Scripture makes it clear that children don’t reason or think like we do.
Any adult looking at our game would naturally assume we knew we were being vandals and we all needed a good horsewhipping – or worse. But we honestly couldn’t see why someone was so upset about bushes.
- We can’t assume our kids understand what they did wrong.
If we don’t clearly explain it they will often jump to a wrong conclusion and likely feel they are being treated unfairly.
We were not being punished because the lady was mad or because the police came – natural childhood assumptions. The lady and the police were not the problem. We were being punished because we had destroyed someone else’s property – even though we didn’t realize it was wrong.
- Not realizing it was wrong does not mean we are innocent.
My conscience is clear, but that does not make me innocent.” – 1 Corinthians 4:4
In the Mum Caper our consciences were clear but we certainly were not innocent. And while our ignorance should be taken into account we still needed to receive appropriate consequences.
Consequences commensurate with “the crime” could include being made to clean up the mess, buy her flowers to replace the ones we destroyed, perhaps be required to rake and clean her lawn for a month. Probably all of the above plus a few other acts of reparation so we understand the gravity of our vandalism and in an attempt to compensate our neighbor for her loss.
Children are not little adults. When they misbehave we can’t automatically assume they know what they did was wrong. But through loving guidance we can look forward to a day when they give up childish ways and grow into adults that honor God and bring honor to us, too.
When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child.
When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.
– 1 Corinthians 13:11-12
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