Cheap Checkout Line Junk
One of the Parkers’ go-to parenting books is Parenting with Love and Logic, by Foster Cline and Jim Fay. For a while it was used in some school districts as a structure for classroom management. To oversimplify, instead of laying down the law, the parent offers carefully curated choices and allows the child to experience the benefits and consequences of those choices.
Instead of locking into the argument about bedtime, “Go to bed right now, or else!”, you might say something like, “Would you prefer to brush your teeth right now and then go to bed, or would you like to read a book first, then brush your teeth and go to bed?”
Instead of lecturing a kid who wants to spend all their money on worthless junk from the checkout line, you might say something like, “Would you rather have this thing that will break as soon as we get in the car right now, or have the super awesome thing you’ve been saving for in two weeks?” Then, when they choose the useless junk, as they usually do, there’s still no lecture, just, “I’m so sorry that happened. I’ll look forward to seeing how you handle this in the future.”
The idea is to allow kids to make choices and experience consequences for those choices when the stakes are relatively low.
There are several benefits to this approach. One of which is that we minimize the volcanic eruption of arguments with a 4 year old, where we as the adults tend to behave a bit more like the 4 year old. Another benefit is that we teach our kids how to self-regulate, how to delay gratification, and how to identify the root of the decisions we need to make.
One of the reasons I like this approach to parenting is that I think this is a little bit like how God deals with us. We’re not usually lectured by God, but we are often allowed the opportunity to experience the consequences of the choices we make.
In many instances the stakes are relatively low.
In others the stakes are eternal.
The root of the human condition is in the first decision to choose “Not God”. The biblical story presents Adam and Eve, in the garden, with complete moral innocence and without even the knowledge of the difference between good and evil. God gives them the opportunity to choose Him or not Him. The choice, as we know, was “Not God”. And we’ve lived with the consequences of that decision ever since.
Yet the decision remains ever before us. Will we choose God, or Not God?
Sin distorts our view of reality, mistaking good for ill and ill for good, and we rarely stop to consider the guidance of the One who designed it all and knows how it works best.
And human history repeats in endless cycle, “Humans will choose their own systems and solutions to solve the problem of sin all the time, every time.”
And we repeatedly find that when we turn to human solutions we find them to be checkout line junk that breaks as soon as we get to the car. They are cheap imitations of the thing of immeasurable worth.
And the decision remains forever before us. Will we choose God, or Not God?
Instead of locking into the argument about bedtime, “Go to bed right now, or else!”, you might say something like, “Would you prefer to brush your teeth right now and then go to bed, or would you like to read a book first, then brush your teeth and go to bed?”
Instead of lecturing a kid who wants to spend all their money on worthless junk from the checkout line, you might say something like, “Would you rather have this thing that will break as soon as we get in the car right now, or have the super awesome thing you’ve been saving for in two weeks?” Then, when they choose the useless junk, as they usually do, there’s still no lecture, just, “I’m so sorry that happened. I’ll look forward to seeing how you handle this in the future.”
The idea is to allow kids to make choices and experience consequences for those choices when the stakes are relatively low.
There are several benefits to this approach. One of which is that we minimize the volcanic eruption of arguments with a 4 year old, where we as the adults tend to behave a bit more like the 4 year old. Another benefit is that we teach our kids how to self-regulate, how to delay gratification, and how to identify the root of the decisions we need to make.
One of the reasons I like this approach to parenting is that I think this is a little bit like how God deals with us. We’re not usually lectured by God, but we are often allowed the opportunity to experience the consequences of the choices we make.
In many instances the stakes are relatively low.
In others the stakes are eternal.
The root of the human condition is in the first decision to choose “Not God”. The biblical story presents Adam and Eve, in the garden, with complete moral innocence and without even the knowledge of the difference between good and evil. God gives them the opportunity to choose Him or not Him. The choice, as we know, was “Not God”. And we’ve lived with the consequences of that decision ever since.
Yet the decision remains ever before us. Will we choose God, or Not God?
Sin distorts our view of reality, mistaking good for ill and ill for good, and we rarely stop to consider the guidance of the One who designed it all and knows how it works best.
And human history repeats in endless cycle, “Humans will choose their own systems and solutions to solve the problem of sin all the time, every time.”
And we repeatedly find that when we turn to human solutions we find them to be checkout line junk that breaks as soon as we get to the car. They are cheap imitations of the thing of immeasurable worth.
And the decision remains forever before us. Will we choose God, or Not God?
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