Its hard being a parent

I'm not going to tell who but this past Saturday, I walked around the side of my house after a hard day of landscaping and cleaning the yard up and what did I see?  One of my 11 year olds texting...to a boy.

Um...

No.  I don't think so.

Have you been there?  At that moment, my "little girl" ceased being a little girl and became...a pre-teen.

I shutter to even think about it.

I knew it was coming.  I just was in denial.  The thing that is most troubling for me is to think that with all of the years that we had up to this point, did I do everything I could to teach them right from wrong?  Was it enough?

In Christ, I don't think we have to ask that.  Deuteronomy 6 sets a high precedent for parents.  One that I believe even the best intentioned, stay at home parents during the Old Testament days even had problems with.  I like to use it to drive me, but I need a jumping off point.  I need something for the "b" team.  I found that in Proverbs 22:6 - "Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it."

I like that.  You don't have to be perfect as a parent.  You just have to Love God.  Your kids will see that and that will be the training that they need.  What's funny is that even Deuteronomy 6 isn't all that hard when your heart is truly bent toward God.  Those things come naturally.

Later on in the day, after many m&m's and my blood pressure came down, I sat down with her.  She began to cry and said that she realized her mistake.  Now don't get me wrong, its not easy to "play" me.  I am in-tune to my kids as far as when they are turning on the tears to get me to let them off the hook.  However, I saw a genuine sense of remorse because when the punishment was issued (no cell phone privileges at our house) she was good with that.  She didn't like it, but she was good with it. 

Kids are like boomerangs, they may occasionally smack you up side the head unexpectedly, but they usually come back to where they started from.  Thanks God for being right.