This is the title of a new post on one of my favorite blogs this morning. See it Here. Very appropriate. It's a must read, please take the couple minutes to read it.
Why do familes hurt one another? Why do we as family members treat each other in a different way then we would treat a friend? (Perhaps because a friend can walk away permanently?) Why do family members feel they have the "right" to tell another in their family how or in which manner they ought to run their lives, raise their children, conduct their business, live out their faith? Huge subjects even without someone's judgment breathing down our back eh?
How about if you are a young adult and are being judged? So, so damaging. What if you are a young adult who is different than your parents? Oh boy.....fireworks. What if you are a young adult and you are different, and you are being judged and you see things VERY differently? Now it's a real mess. Are you any less of a person who has any less dignity? Are you worth less in the family?
Why must there be this sort of conflict? The problem is as old as human beings. The solution is as old as Christ. Forgiveness, understanding, trying to walk in another's shoes.
We are not all the same. We do not all think the same. Outside the objectively moral realm, what is right for one is not right for another. This sounds so obvious yet we try and put our idea of what we think someone's life ought to be squarely on their shoulders with the weight of a boulder. It is unfair and unkind at the least. It is full of pride.
Think about how we can make another person miserable. It does not have to be anything big. Small jabs, little criticisms, a nasty face when our approval is sought. Withholding our approval, our kindness, our love. This is serious and cruel and it certainly achieves it's desired effect.
We do not have to love everyone as in being their best friend, but we do have to love everyone in that we should not be making them miserable and we should be ready to help if necessary. Love means wanting the best for another person, wanting them to get to heaven in the end, but "the best" is not necessarily what we think is best but what God thinks is best.....keeping our own opinions out of it.....therin lies the problem within families.
Why can a family member's decisions not be respected even if they are not our own? If they are totally different than what we might do? Does God not achieve His mission with all different sorts of folks? He did create all these different kinds of people after all. Is one member so much better than another that they are always right? Silly.
Okay, even if we think our opinion is the best and most important (and it is not being followed), is that worth losing relationships over? Obviously for many, many people it is. I see this often, I have done this often...too often.
So let's get this straight (insert confused face).....being RIGHT is more important than being HAPPY? REALLY?
Losing the happiness and peace in a family over being right is more important than accepting someone's decisions that are different than ours? Okay...got it. Makes sense right? NOT.
Think about it. Pray about it. Are you the perpetrator or the one judged? Or both?
Remember you and I will spend eternity with some of the folks who either inflict this pain on you and I or on whom we inflict this pain. Oh boy.
~Blessings~
Lisa
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