We moved recently and as we turned my boys bunk beds around I found the verses that I had printed out and taped to their bed when they were 4 and 2. I was shocked, amused and horrified to read these verses in light of the grace that I am beginning to understand. Here was the law-driven diet I was feeding their little souls:

Proverbs 14:7, 11:29, 16:32, 19:11, 2 Timothy 2:21-23 (see above picture)

My answer to their constant fighting? Stop! Stop fighting! Don't you know the Bible says people who fight are foolish, and weak, and not of the Lord! I put these verses on their beds in the hope that the law would accomplish heart change. I believed the law would work and change my boys into sweet kids who were always kind and never fought. I was demanding of my children and ended up being the one who acted foolishly. I was demanding of my children what they did not have the power the do, and I was demanding that law produce the change I wanted to see.

Was it wrong to have these verses on my children’s beds? No, the Bible is beautiful, it's wisdom; it is all we need for life. My manipulation of these verses was what was wrong. I wasn't seeing the real truth in these verses. I was not seeing the gospel of glorious grace. Instead I could have shared with my child that there is only One who is slow to anger. One who was slow to anger even though we rush foolishly, headlong into wrath. There is only One who continues to be slow to anger, even though I believe my anger will achieve all I want in life, (peace, quiet, children who never quarrel). I could have told them that there was only One who ever ruled His Spirit. He ruled his spirit in the Garden of Gethsemane, He ruled the anguish he felt, the anger that must have tempted him when he found his friends sleeping. There is only One who truly had good sense and overlooked offense. The gospel is right here in these very Proverbs I attempted to use to make my kids "good." The truth that He has overlooked my offenses, and that makes me want to glorify Him.  When I share these truths with my children, I see the beauty of grace and I am changed. When I understand the gospel, I am no longer ruled by anger when I see them disobey, and I can share this liberating grace with them. We are both foolish, we are both weak, we both believe our anger will accomplish what we deem as righteous or good, but the truth is if we are in Him, even in our anger He overlooks our offenses. Even in our forgetting that we are "servants of the Lord" we counted as One who is never quarrelsome.

Amazing grace! How can it be? That you my King wouldst die for me!

Here is another funny picture from a friend that also thought law was the way to make your children good. Enjoy! The verse she is holding is below, just in case you can't see it. You can most definitely see the joy inexpressible on her face.

I John 2:3 "Hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep His commandments."