Spitting in your face

Do you ever just WANT to be mad at your kids?  After they’ve been rude, disrespectful, called you names – basically been downright mean?  After all you’ve done for them - make meals, buy them clothes, pay the bills, give them a place to sleep, love them over and over again – and this is how they treat you!  Its almost as if for all your kindness they spit in your face…

Spit in your face.  I was thinking about that today.  I was reminded of another person who went through something similar.  The guards spit in His face.  And what did He do?  After all they had done to him, he said, “Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they’re doing.”

Wow.  I can’t do that.  There are days I want to stay mad at my kids.  I want them to feel miserable because they’ve made me feel miserable.  I want them to have sorrow for all the verbal garbage they’ve flung at me.  I need God to remind me that they really don’t know what they’re doing.  I need God’s power to be able to forgive them and love them even though I may not get anything in return.  That takes supernatural strength.  Something that without God, I don’t have.

(NOTE: I’m on a ‘reading fast’ this week – part of a course I’m doing, so if you leave any comments, I won’t be reading them until Sunday or Monday.  If you’re looking for a conversation, probably best to pick up a phone and give me a call 🙂 )