After everything I've done for you!!!

Once again all four kids are screaming in the truck.

This morning I was working on a real estate project with my friend Sky and decided to bring all four kids along. I had the perfect idea: “Let’s all go pick up breakfast from the coffee shop, we’ll have breakfast sandwiches and treats and the kids will play in the mud while I spend 45 minutes without issues because they’ll be so grateful,” I said to myself. So, arduously, I load up into the car and head off to the coffee shop. (Does it take any one else 40 minutes to get everyone into the car?).

Of course this plan was little more than a pipe dream. After picking up our breakfast and treats at the coffee shop we arrive at the meeting location and before long the bickering ensues. One kid is crying, and one is mad. The screaming kid totally puts a damper on the business conversation at hand and I’m then I’m mad. My go-to thought at that moment is this: “After everything I’ve done for you, this is how you’re going to repay me?! We had an awesome morning lined up with special treats and everything and you’re going to just ruin it?!”

This whole scenario reminds me of the quote from my oft quoted favorite parenting book by Paul David Tripp. “Don’t make personal what’s not personal.” Yet I did it again. There’s roughly a zero percent chance that today my kids were sitting in the truck after enjoying their treats on this sunny and melty February morning and consciously plotted together to start a fight in order to really get dad mad. It just happens. Because this is normal. Because this is what kids do. It’s not about me.

There’s a general principle in life that applies to all human relationships but certainly applies here: Other people are usually not thinking about you. They’re usually thinking about themselves. It happens to me when I send a text to a friend and they don’t respond right away. My assumption is that they might be upset with me because of something I said. I’ll assume something crazy like that they don’t want to be friends because they’re not responding. Invariably they respond a day later because they were busy with something totally unrelated to me. It’s not about me.

Back to my kids screaming in the truck. I’m tempted to make their interpersonal relationships with each other about me. I somehow jump to the conclusion that I deserve their best behavior and interaction with each other because I went out of my way to buy them a sugary treat. When I put it that way of course it sounds ridiculous. So yet again this morning I need the reminder that their messy interpersonal interactions are NOT about me, and but they ARE an opportunity to point each one of them towards the reconciler that they do need in Jesus. These moments are not an accident but an opportunity to shepherd these kids towards Him.