It all began when the Furbies entered our home.

Our children had Christmas money to spend from their well-meaning grandma (who, truth be told, would have bought the Furbies herself in a heartbeat for them). But there was something about my children choosing to spend their hard-earned (given) Christmas money on Furbies that made me roll my eyes. Really? I thought. Really? 

But these were not just any Furbies, these were Furbies Boom! (I hope I am constructing the correct plural there, like Surgeons General.) I’m not sure what the Boom! adds, because they seem to be just as annoying as a regular Furby.

Anyway, in a moment of rare parental clarity, I shrugged my shoulders and said to my wife, “Well, I suppose we don’t spend our money any differently. Our toys are just more sophisticated and socially acceptable.”

If there is one thing I am thankful for this Christmas break, it is that the time to pause has allowed for truth to creep in. Actually, I’m not thankful for this at all; it’s all been rather painful, this time for truth:

  • realizing that I’m very good at doing and not so good at being
  • finding my rationalizations of things (from pastoring to parenting) aren’t even convincing to me
  • noticing the discrepancy between the parent I say I want to be and the one I actually am.

I am at a point in this journey called parenting where I am not sure about anything, except that the love and mercy and forgiveness of Jesus trump everything. 

I spend a good part of my days trying to convince my children to do this or not do that, to make “good choices” (whatever that means) and to otherwise live as civil human beings. Most of the time, however, “good parental guiding” finds me yelling in forceful language with words that elevate scratched DVDs and CDs and rooms that need cleaned to a moral status even I’m uncomfortable with. And then telling the Furbies to just shut up.

Hi, I’m Matt, and I yell at Furbies Boom!

Parenting fail.

And then I remember my toddler kissing Jesus.

I somehow taught her this, without realizing what I was doing. We’d walk over to the Advent wreath and the Nativity and she’d say, “Baby!” and I would pick up the tiny Nativity baby Jesus and she would kiss him, her tiny toddler lips eclipsing his whole head. Smooch!

Kissing Jesus.

Most of the time what I call “parenting” is really about me running from the truth. But if I sit with my own failures long enough, if I actually listen to the struggles of my children, if I take a break from the yelling for a few seconds… if I can bear the weight of another parenting FAIL(ure), then I find myself where I need to be: very aware of my own sin and desperately hungry for the mercy of Jesus.

Kissing Jesus.

That’s my new parenting philosophy. Doing my best to cover my children with the love of Jesus and invite them into walking his ways, not as in “being good” but as in “trusting in his mercy.” And if there is one thing they grow up with–and I’m not convinced I’ve taught them this as fully as I’d like–it’s that when they stumble and fall and fail, that we might take each other to the manger and kiss Jesus and receive his forgiveness and love.

Smooch!