Creatively Disobedient Kids

It’s always interesting to see how creative kids can get when they don’t want to obey. In last week’s blog we told the story about our daughter when Carla called her name 3 different times and on the 3rd time she ran to Carla saying, “I didn’t hear you the first 2 times you called.” Kids think they can be like an ostrich by putting their head in the sand and ignore the fact that they heard their name called or that you asked them to clean their room.

You tell your daughter to clean her room. When you go to check on her you see she has been playing with something that caught her eye and when you ask why the room is not clean she says the 2 magic words “I forgot!” Most parents assume their kids did forget and the child chalks that up to a win for her because she knew exactly what her mom wanted her to do.

Right up there with “I forgot”, the other popular excuse children make is “I don’t remember.” Please don’t think for a second they didn’t remember or they forgot you told them to clean their room. They remember, they just don’t want to get in trouble when you see it isn’t done.

When I (Carla) went to check on one of our daughters when I had told her to clean her room, I found her playing on the floor with her dolls. She told me she was dressing them for church! While your kids will continue to come up with creative excuses, we trust you will not be taken in by them.

Your concern should be whether your child obeyed you as Colossians 3:20 says, “Children, obey your parents in everything.” “Everything” does not leave any room for excuses or loopholes. It means they must follow through with what you told them to do to be obedient. How do you get a child to obey? We have great resources listed at the end of this blog that will help you with that.

But why should a child obey their parents? The last part of Colossians 3:20 says, “because this pleases the Lord.” Getting kids to obey parents is the first priority while they are growing up. But as they grow and mature they will transition to start obeying their Heavenly Father as they first learned to obey you.

God gave each of your kids to you because of how God created you! God made you a specific way and equipped you by taking you through life’s trials and triumphs to prepare you to train up these children in the way they need to go so they will be able to do what He created them to do. If you don’t require your kids to obey you in reality you are training them not to obey God!

We want to urge you to require your kids to obey you and other people in positions of authority in their lives with good attitudes. We don’t think if we do something we know God wants us to do with a surly attitude He considers that obedience, do you?

Joshua 1:7