The question was something like, if Jesus has died for our sin and we are not expected to be perfect, why do we teach our kids to try to be perfect? First off, I hope we aren't teaching our kids to be perfect. I find myself fearing that that is happening with my kids at school where the standards are high and not getting pink slips is the first thing they tell me about. Pink slips are the school's way of communicating with parents that there was a problem during the day with schoolwork that is not passing, or behavior that needs to be addressed. I know that there are a lot of ways for my kids to think that good grades mean good kid and bad grades mean bad kid, and that is just not true.
I've been thinking about what Jesus did for us and what it means for us in our lives here on Earth. We were all failing. F students so to speak. We didn't meet the standard. Jesus took the test and aced it for all of us. We are now A students. The pressure to perform and get the A is removed. But we are still in school. We are still students performing at different levels working up to that A level. What does that mean? First of all it takes all the fairness out of the question. When the playing field was level we all failed. Jesus leveled it again, but now he lifts up the low spots and brings down the high spots for each of us. We have to get to know Him and follow Him and let him make the field level for us. He knows how to move the standard so that we can make it a little higher by degrees. I think this means we need to tailor our standards to the people we are leading. Some of our kids can do more in some areas than others, so we need to set their standard higher. Some kids need a lower standard for now.
The complication for parents or teachers or pastors or counselors is that people start pointing at their counter parts yelling it isn't fair. No, it isn't. What they really mean (we really mean) is that they are getting more goodness than I am. I want them to come down to my standard, or I want to be moved up to theirs without doing the work to get there. For the ones setting the standard we have to be willing to be questioned. Sometimes we can explain the apparent discrepancy, and sometimes we can't. It takes a lot of wisdom. A lot of Bible study. A lot of prayer. A lot of counsel. A lot of reading. A lot of accountability. A lot of life experience. A lot of repentance.
Jesus met the standard. We can't. We have an enemy that likes to whisper in our ears that God is not fair and we are getting screwed. Our flesh wants to believe that. We want it to be someone else's fault so we can stop striving to give ourselves up and follow Jesus. We want life to be easy an easy A, but it isn't. Some days we want to be OK with a D. Some days we want to study harder and get some extra credit. Jesus wants us to quit looking at ourselves. He wants us to look at Him, listen to Him, follow Him. We need to do that ourselves, and we need to help everyone around us do that too. Some people will be closer to our level of competency which makes those relationships easier. Some require us to be OK with a lower standard for a while. They need lots of encouragement and coaching and grace. Some people will be more competent than we are and we will need to listen to them and follow them. We will need to resist the urge to be jealous of what they have and to appreciate what God has done for them.
I think as parents we need to keep in view what the ultimate standard is. The ultimate standard is death of ourselves, and total abandon to God. How in the world do you teach that to your kids? You start by striving for it yourself. You love your spouse as selflessly as you can today. You repent when you realize you fell short. If that happened in front of the kids, then repentance needs to be in front of the kids. We need to make every effort to get ourselves out of our parenting. We are raising God's kids. They are selfish little beasts just like us and they teach us to obey through our suffering. They are the joy set before us, and we need to delight in them. We need to teach them to lay their lives down for their siblings and their friends. They won't like it, just like we don't. They will test us over and over and we need to make sure that we are dealing with our selfishness first and then walking them through theirs. This will grow up along with them and require more wisdom from us. Keep seeking God in His Word and Prayer. Keep repenting. Keep repenting. Keep repenting. They will see that we aren't perfect, but that we trust God. They will follow us in that if we place our hope in Him, and not them. They will disappoint us, and we need to repent of that.
We will lose our kids (although God's grace is sufficient here too) if we try to make them think we are perfect and they should just follow us. Or if we think we can send them to the perfect church or school or camp or college and they will do things perfectly. If we beat them over the head with the law, or even God's grace in our anger and frustration. If we think looking perfect is good we have seriously missed the point. Jesus didn't look perfect. He wasn't the poster child for law keeping in His community. He was the straight A student who allows us all to be His people. He covered us so we can be human with His Spirit bursting through our weakness. We need to teach our kids to strive for that.
I think maybe one element of the question is that we assume we know what the perfect standard looks like. It should look like Jesus. Too often it looks like a clean, sweet smelling, smiling, healthy person, who says, "yes, Ma'am" at all the right times, who has a 4.0 gpa, who speaks well to everyone, who is athletic, and funny, who goes to bed on time and always does their chores... You know, the annoying kid that most everybody loves to hate. Our standard for our kids needs to look like that kid with Jesus shining through the cracks. Our homes need to look like inviting places where someone will smile at you and ask you to come in. They might offer you cookies, or water, or granola or whatever they have. The standard will look different, because we are all different and Jesus came for all of us. Pray about what that standard is for you and your kids and your home. If you try to make your family look like someone else's you are probably making an idol out of something that is good for them, but not necessarily for you. "The standard" is a tricky thing. My best advice is to seek God and His treasure and He will reveal it to you. Give yourself and your family grace as you seek it together. Let Jesus level the field in your home. He has covered all the sin in your home, you don't need to worry about doing it over, just trust Him.
I'm sure there is much more, or maybe that was too much in some direction. This is all me, muddling through what I understand God to be doing in my life. My perspective and intellect are limited, so for what it is worth that would be my answer. May God grade this essay with much grace and mercy.
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