Ok, I admit it. That guy you heard screaming unintelligibly in the next aisle? Yeah, that was me. If you’d had the military-like courage to come over and ask me, I’d have told you I was speaking with conviction and furious glory. But really? I’d just lost my cool and published it in the cloud.
Now, following the admission comes the stark reality that you are standing in what could easily pass for a) a (used) minefield, or b) the center ring in a one ring circus, or c) a public area with lots of expensive and colorful items stacked precariously on their cardboard endcaps all at floor level, or, worst-case-scenario d) all of the above.
Fortunately, because the natural color of my hair is a mottled sort of orange, the grays that are surely sprouting from all available pores are well camouflaged, and difficult to discern.
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I was standing at the top of the stairs, on my way to wake up my beautiful Grr when I heard it. Tigger, at the top of his voice, speaking to his (currently) smaller brother with a familiar conviction and furious glory. Mo had (reportedly) dropped beans on the floor (that’s a primary-offense, usually punished by removal of said dried beans for a given period of time), and Tig was simply reprimanding in a fashion that precedence had ruled acceptable.
Whoops.
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I called him up to Grr’s room. Dutifully he arrived. At that point I apologized. I immediately recognized that Tig had simply done what he’d seen and heard his papa doing, and that I owed him and Mo an apology for being a poor example on the matter of “Techniques for the correction and rebuke of minor, yet terribly aggravating offenses.” I made a covenant with myself (albeit a weak accountability partner) in the company of my firstborn son, and heir to my great estate, that I would not raise my voice as casually as I had. That it was not a gracious way. That really, it was selfish, undisciplined, and base. Not who I want to be.
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I’ve already broken treaty with myself. It’ll be a long road to recovery. But I’m going to keep trying. I want lots of things: I want my boys to obey my voice, not my volume. And I DON’T want my boys to be afraid of me. But most importantly, I want them to know that there’s a difference between being disciplined and being hated.
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It’s interesting that I gleaned this little distinction from a man younger than me, unmarried, with NO kids. But he has subjected himself to the authority of his teachers, and learned a great deal much earlier than most of us do because of it. We were discussing the matter of discipline, because my boys were running amuck and amusing their less gentile natures outside. And he said something that was plain but very profound. The punishment follows the breaking of a rule. It isn’t about me being angry, or disappointed, or any of that. And when I yell, I communicate anger, not authority. Discipline brings blessing. Anger causes hurt.
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So: in the matter of the people vs. Mo, we find the defendant guilty as charged. Time served. In the corollary matter of the people vs. His father, guardian and steward, we find the defendant guilty of misguided frustration, misdirected selfishness, and we forgive him his debts as we forgive our debtors. He is henceforth remanded to the agency of the kingdom of the Father, and will from this point forward “go forth and sin no more”. Yeah right. BUT, he will resolve to more righteously use tone and volume as it pertains to bringing well-adjusted and Jesus-loving men into this world which we live in. Amen and thank-you, God, for grace, which issues ever forth for the benefit of fathers, mothers, daughters and sons.
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