Tripp bringt mein Dilemma als Erzieher auf den Punkt (hier): Erziehen ist eine freudige Unmöglichkeit.
Er beginnt mit dem Gefühl, das ich auch kenne – etwa am Abend eines anstrengenden Tages.
I felt like I had nothing left to face the next day of a thousand sibling battles, a thousand authority encounters, a thousand reminders, a thousand warnings, a thousand corrections, a thousand discipline moments, a thousand explanations, a thousand times of talking about the presence and grace of Jesus, a thousand times of helping the children to look in the mirror of God’s Word and see themselves with accuracy, a thousands “please forgive me’s,” and a thousand “I love you’s.”
Aus diesem tiefen Bewusstsein der Unzulänglichkeit heraus scheint die befreiende Gnade umso heller. Darum die Freude!
- I faced the fact that I had no ability whatsoever to change my children.
I began to understand that if all my children needed was a set of rules and a parent to function as a judge, jury, and jailer, Jesus would have never needed to come. … I began to realize that as a parent I had not been called to be the producer of change, but to be a willing tool in the powerful hands of a God who alone has the power and willingness to undo us and rebuild us again. - I faced the fact that in order to be a tool of grace, I desperately needed grace myself.
Like them, I am naturally independent and self-sufficent. Like them, I don’t always love authority and esteem wisdom. Like them, I often want to write my own rules and pursue my own plan. Like them, I want life to be predictable, comfortable, and easy. Like them, I would again and again make life all about me.
