There's an ugh in your eye

Anyone with teenagers understands the utter frustration of the eye roll. When coupled with the grunt of "ugh" it can engender more than simple frustration. It can incite anger, perhaps even rage, but mostly it begets despair. With half a syllable, a young man or woman can destroy the relationship with a parent. The level of disregard, disdain, and disrespect communicated by this simple act is beyond description. It proclaims loudly and clearly that the child entirely rejects everything the parent has ever provided. The long, sleepless nights during the teething, ignored. The encouragement on that scary first day of school, useless. Every dime spent housing, feeding, and clothing the offspring, inadequate. The deep abiding love the parent feels in his innermost being for the child, vomited out like a bit of bad fish.

The Bible, of course, is not silent on this interaction. Paul strongly, but wisely, reminds children that obedience to their parents is not only a commandment from God, but a commandment with a promise. God understands teenagers. He gets that sometimes simply telling them "what" is not the best way to achieve His will. He also lets them in on why in Eph 6:1-3. Yes, it essentially boils down to "it's for your own good," but when the Heavenly Father says it there's more substance than when this earthly father does so. One has to go back in the OT to find out exactly what "for your own good" really means in God's terms.

As a father who has received disrespect from his children, God has a very strong reaction to it. If I think the fires of my righteous indignation are banked high when the kids are little snits, it's nothing compared to God's anger over it. Proverbs 30:17 puts it this way:

As for the eye that ridicules a father and despises obedience to a mother, may ravens of the valley pluck it out and young vultures eat it.

Yep, disrespect from children to parents gets God's dander up. I'm hurt and angry when it happens to me; God gets down right vengeful about it. I say to the kids, "I hope one day you understand how much this hurts." God says, "may the ravens of the valley pluck [your eye] out and young vultures eat it." He's not pulling any punches. So when God says respecting your parents is for your own good what He means is that disrespecting your parents is worthy of His righteous and holy wrath. I have to agree with God that avoiding it is most decidedly for your own good. Bottom line, when you roll your eyes and "ugh" at me, you may hurt me in my heart of hearts, but, worse, you make God fighting mad. I love you enough to caution you against such behavior. I should probably turn that advice back on myself, too, especially when I want to roll my eyes and ugh at God.

Finding Consistency

I wrote and posted the following to Ricochet, but I'm cross posting it here for those who can't get to it there. It is not an entirely spiritual post, but it has very strong spiritual overtones.

I was rewatching the TV show Scrubs when an episode played in which Elliot (hot blond doctor) discovered that she finally had the mentor she always wanted in Molly (hot blond psychiatrist.) Almost immediately following the discovery she also found out that Molly had a terrible personal life. She realized that her newly found mentor might not be the best person to guide her because, even though she was a rising star professionally, on a personal level she was a train wreck. In the end, Elliot thought to herself, "Listening to Molly made me realize a person doesn't have to be perfect to be exactly what you need." She concluded that she could accept the good with the bad and not discard her friend.

We conservatives can be pretty binary at times. We see things as black or white, good or bad, right or wrong. We can even do this with people. We declare a person lost if certain defects come to light. However, we are often also spiritual people who believe strongly in redemption, renewal, and restoration. We profess faith in the limitless love of the ultimate judge who is full of mercy and grace even while being perfectly holy and just. This can cause a bit of a conundrum on occasion  It is probably the main area where conservatives experience cognitive dissonance.

Another troubling aspect can be that we draw lines behind which we always stand. I'm not making accusations of hypocrisy, but at times I do get a little sense of the Pharisee's prayer among us in that we thank God we're not sinners like those others, even though a completely honest evaluation would find us, along with all of humanity, in the same sinking ship in need of rescue. Everyone of us has some defect we hope no one ever discovers. 

Of course, we are people who make such an honest evaluation. We prize consistency. We fervently seek intellectual honesty. When we search deeply enough we find in us the same burning compassion for people the left has because we do not believe ourselves above the common condition and weakness of humanity. We are far more rational and practical in seeking solutions to the plight of the downtrodden, but the basic desire to uplift others is very much present because we know the depths from which we have personally been raised. We're not, as the left would contend, cold and heartless. We're not going to push granny over the cliff, force orphans into the street to steal or starve, or incarcerate people for life over minor infractions.

But (there's always a but), are we entirely consistent in our judgments? We seek to emulate the holiness and justice of God, but we also must mirror his mercy and grace. The problem is that, not being God, we aren't quite equipped to do both simultaneously. We have to choose to be just or to be merciful. How we decide can be very inconsistent. Do we at times declare a person or category of persons beyond redemption? Sure, we're willing to give a drunk another chance once he's sobered up, but what about a person with a more hurtful defect? Do we allow the violent, once the violence has been curbed, back into society? What about a murderer? A rapist? Have we established a hard line beyond which there is no coming back? If we have, is that consistent with our core beliefs in the redemption (not earthly perfection) of man?

To make this personal, and to get back to the original anecdote, what do we do with friends and family when defects of character surface? How do you handle discovering your best friend has cheated on his wife? What is appropriate when someone you esteem highly admits to having a little too much love for the drink, or cheats on his taxes, or has an internet pornography problem? Yes, each situation is unique, but surely there are some guidelines, some basic philosophical or spiritual concepts to shepherd the process and help us achieve consistency.