Why Your Parents Act Like That (Part 3)

Six-year old Jill was helping her father Dave do some gardening in the front yard. She chattered away about her Sunday school lesson on Adam and Eve. Dave asked her, “Did you know Adam and Eve sinned?” Jill replied, “Yes.” “What did God do to them as a punishment?” Dave asked again. Her answer was immediate and matter-of-fact, without even looking up: “He made them have kids.” (From the illustration database of Sermon Central)

Sometimes parenting is so challenging that it seems like punishment for our sins! Let us finish the “Seven Ways to Understand Your Parents,” which I heard in “Family Matters” (a radio program hosted by Rev. Clem Guillermo and Carmen Go-Vargas aired every Monday to Friday, 9:30AM, over 702 DZAS AM). We already saw that 1) there is no parenting school; 2) our parents lived in a different world; 3) our grandparents “experimented” on our parents also; 4) our parents want to protect us from mistakes they committed in the past; 5) they have pressures, too; and 6) they love you so much but they just don’t know any better.

Lastly, our parents are growing old. As you are growing to your prime they are growing through mid-life crisis and all other sorts of crisis. Just seeing you grow makes your parents feel older. Most of all, they miss the child who looks up to them. Before, when we were just five years old, we thought our parents can do everything and anything. As we grow, we see their imperfections and their mistakes. We end up not looking up to them but looking down on them. However, Proverbs 23:22 commands us: “Listen to your father, who gave you life, and do not despise your mother when she is old.” The Message translates it this way: “Listen with respect to the father who raised you, and when your mother grows old, don't neglect her.” I noticed a pattern. When people grow old, they realize their parents were right all along. That realization would either be a blessing or a curse depending on how we responded to our parents and how we treated them.

My take? Let us make our parents feel that having us is a privilege, not a punishment.

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