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POSITIVE PARENTING
By Dr. Dick Hardel
Metro Lutheran
Michael Sherer, Editor

Understand and Live in Grace

From the Study of Effective Education by Search Institute (1990) we have learned that 83% of high school teenagers do not understand grace. But the reason they do not understand grace is not because pastors and Sunday school teachers have done a poor job in their preaching and teaching. In faith formation what is modeled in the home is slightly more influential than what is preached and taught in the worship service or Sunday school. Faith is caught more than it is taught. Despite wonderful words by parents and other adults, children and youth learn by what they experience and observe in a relationship. The same study shows that 67 % of all Lutheran adults do not understand grace.

Far too many children and youth grow up in homes, even Christian homes, where the parents focus on modeling perfection, not grace. It is almost an, “I’ll love you when you have accomplished the specific tasks on my list for you. Often parents are quick to find fault, but slow to bless their children.

Because of original sin and actual sin, children will give their parents many opportunities not to love them. But the same is true of parents. Parents will also give their children many opportunities not to love them. In our sin we do things that make it difficult for people to love us. But as a family rooted in the gospel of Jesus Christ we are to model grace. The very opportunities not to love are the most important times to model grace and to love. Grace is undeserved love. In Romans 5:8 St. Paul shows us how God modeled grace to us, But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us (NRSV). Grace surprises us. Parents are to surprise their children with undeserved love. Children are to surprise their parents with undeserved love.

When grace isn’t modeled, judgments are stored up, looking for an opportunity to jump upon someone’s faults. I remember well, how my father was so quick to point out any mistake I made. It seemed to me that I just could not do anything good enough to gain his approval. Since I wasn’t surprised by grace, I stored up judgment and waited for him to make a mistake. It finally came late in his life, when he came to Florida to spend a week with his grandchildren and with us. My father always had to be repairing something around the house. So he painted all the nicks in the woodwork in our house. But his eyes had been failing him in his older years and he used the wrong shade of brown in his effort to touch the woodwork inside our house. I remember becoming as angry and expressing it loudly. “Great, Dad, now I will have to take a day off work and re-do the woodwork inside our house!” It sounded exactly like what I had heard him express to me when I was younger. I was ashamed at what I had expressed, but just like my father, I did not know how to admit I was wrong and ask for forgiveness. A wonderful opportunity to surprise my father with love and grace became a response to stored-up judgment. God has called us as children, neighbors, friends, parents, grandparents, uncles, aunts, and caregivers not only to understand grace, but to live in grace. I wonder what my children learned from me?

FAMILY ACTIVITIES

• At a family devotion time read aloud Romans 5: 8-10. Tell each other stories when you were surprised by grace.
• At a family time each member of the family share a definition of grace. Discuss what to do when feelings of anger are being stored up against another person.
• Using a concordance to the Bible, look at all the passages in Scripture that use the word, grace. Read 10 passages aloud from the Old Testament and 10 passages from the New Testament.
• For a family time together, each member of the family writes or draws a response to the question, “What is so surprising about grace?
• Share with each member of the family times when you experience grace. What feelings did you have during this experience of grace?