The Yoke, The Pointing Finger, and The Judge

July 4, 2015September 20, 2015 Stephanie G. Cox, M.S.Ed

Isaiah 58:6-10

“Is this not the fast which I choose,
To loosen the bonds of wickedness,
To undo the bands of the yoke,
And to let the oppressed go free
And break every yoke?
“Is it not to divide your bread with the hungry
And bring the homeless poor into the house;
When you see the naked, to cover him;
And not to hide yourself from your own flesh?
“Then your light will break out like the dawn,
And your recovery will speedily spring forth;
And your righteousness will go before you;
The glory of the Lord will be your rear guard.
“Then you will call, and the Lord will answer;
You will cry, and He will say, ‘Here I am.’
If you remove the yoke from your midst,
The pointing of the finger and speaking wickedness,
And if you give yourself to the hungry
And satisfy the desire of the afflicted,
Then your light will rise in darkness
And your gloom will become like midday.”

This passage shows God wants to break the yoke of oppression which He did through Jesus. In fact, Jesus said, “For My yoke is easy and My burden is light” (Matthew11:30, NASB). Yet, many Christians do the exact opposite of what Isaiah 58:6-10 tells us to do.

Christians point their fingers at others, especially children. Christians put the yoke of oppression on others, especially children. And Christians judge!

I have been guilty of pointing fingers and judging myself. I am far from perfect.

Of course, before I get into how we do this with children, I need to comment about the most recent ways Christians are pointing fingers, placing the yoke of oppression onto others, and are judging. This week the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that gay marriage should be allowed in every state. This has Facebook going nuts. Many Christians are angry. People are arguing. Memes are going around. And many profile pictures have rainbows on them.

I’ve stayed out of it for the most part except for commenting on a few friends’ posts.

I believe the act of engaging in homosexual acts is a sin according to the Bible. I believe that marriage is between a man and a woman as even Jesus reiterated in Matthew 19:4-6. Marriage is a symbol of the covenant between God and the Church, therefore, it is Holy Matrimony. That being said, this is not a Christian nation. I’m not sure if it was ever really founded on Christian principles. What this country was founded on is freedom. That includes freedom of religion. I am free to follow Jesus and worship Him openly. There is a reason for the separation of church and state. The government has no business telling us what religion or deity to follow.

Allowing gays to marry is simply giving them freedom. Do I agree with that lifestyle? No. Is it my job to push my Biblical belief onto them? No.

I am not condoning the lifestyle of homosexuality. But, God gives us free will. They are free to live how they want. They’ll never enter into Holy Matrimony, but since this is a free country and as long as they’re not hurting anyone but themselves, I believe they should have equal rights.

If we want them to come to Jesus, we need to love them as Jesus does. We are all sinners. Stop judging, pointing fingers, and placing the yoke of oppression on them and just give them grace and love. They already know we disagree. Instead of making this such a huge deal, why not quietly show them love by remaining peaceful? It doesn’t mean we condone it. It just means we be Jesus to them.

Now, when it comes to children, many Christians also put the yoke of oppression on them, point their fingers at them, and judge them.

The primary way we put the yoke of oppression on children is putting unrealistic, unattainable expectations on them. Expecting infants to sleep through the night is unrealistic and unattainable. Expecting toddlers to control their impulses and emotions is unattainable and unrealistic. Expecting children to cheerfully obey the first time is also unattainable and unrealistic. Christians who have unrealistic, developmentally inappropriate expectations of children oppress them because they do not allow them to be children. They force children to be someone they’re not. Children are not free.

Then when children don’t live up to the unrealistic expectations, they get fingers pointing at them saying how “bratty, sinful, defiant, rotten, spoiled, and horrible” they are. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen this happen to children who were just being children. Of course, many parents point their finger at their children while rebuking them. Yet, the opening passage tells us to stop pointing our fingers at each other. This applies to children too.

Finally, many Christians judge children. They can’t negatively label children without judging them. And with judgment comes punishment by either ignoring an infant’s cries so they “learn to sleep,” which the only thing infants learn through cry-it-out is that we won’t come. They still wake up hungry, scared, in pain, sick, hot, cold, wet, poopy but they won’t cry out because they’ve learned nobody will come. This is not what God wanted. And they don’t enter a natural sleep when left to cry-it-out. Infants’ bodies shut down from all of the stress of crying and they enter a forced state of sleep.

As far as judging children and really, anyone, Jesus says not to do it.

Matthew 7:1-5 states, “Do not judge so that you will not be judged. For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ and behold, the log is in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.”

When we decide that a child deserves punishment for “defiant” behavior, we are judging the child. Instead of judging and meting out what we think is “proper punishment,” we must connect with and discipline the child.

Let us stop, as Christians, doing the very things God is trying to undo. Stop placing the yoke of oppression on others. Let us stop pointing our fingers at others. And let us stop judging each other. May we love one another as the Bible says over and over again.

Knowledge Does NOT Equal Understanding

June 13, 2015September 20, 2015 Stephanie G. Cox, M.S.Ed

I watched this video called, “The Backwards Brain Bicycle.” In this video, a guy has to re-learn how to ride a bike that was built exactly opposite of how typical bikes are built. He was totally taken aback by how difficult and how long it took him to learn how to ride this bike. He had been riding bikes for over 20 years. Finally, he gets the hang of the bike, but then, when getting back on a normal bike, he finds that it takes him a bit to be able to ride it again.

Interestingly, his young son was able to learn to ride a backwards bicycle in just a couple of weeks, thus, showing that young children’s brains have far more plasticity than our adult brains do.

What really hit me with this video is when the guy says, “Knowledge does not equal understanding.” He had plenty of knowledge on bike riding, but make a change to the bike and all that knowledge went right out the window because he just had knowledge without a true understanding of bikes.

All of this got me thinking that the Church today may have a lot of knowledge, but not a lot of understanding. They can memorize Scripture, but do they truly understand the Scripture? I mean, I’ve memorized Scripture as a young Christian because that was the thing to do. However, it never really touched my heart until God revealed Himself to me through particular verses. I may not have exact verses memorized anymore, but I can come up with them when needed because it’s the meaning of Scripture that matters more than just rote recall.

I think when teaching children Scripture, our focus should not be on rote memorization. It should be on getting them to truly understand Scripture.

Let’s look at what the Bible says about being able to truly understand Scripture and, ultimately, the true character of God.

“And he said to them, ‘To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in parables, so that “they may indeed see but not perceive, and may indeed hear but not understand, lest they should turn and be forgiven'” (Mark 4:11-12, ESV).

“And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual” (1 Cornithians 2:13, ESV).

“My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge; because you have rejected knowledge, I reject you from being a priest to me. And since you have forgotten the law of your God, I also will forget your children” (Hosea 4:6, ESV).

*Note: I know Hosea says knowledge but I think it can also mean understanding as God’s people knew Him and His laws, yet they still turned from Him.

“And He spoke many things to them in parables, saying, ‘Behold, the sower went out to sow; and as he sowed, some seeds fell beside the road, and the birds came and ate them up. Others fell on the rocky places, where they did not have much soil; and immediately they sprang up, because they had no depth of soil. But when the sun had risen, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away. Others fell among the thorns, and the thorns came up and choked them out. And others fell on the good soil and yielded a crop, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty. He who has ears, let him hear'” (Matthew 13:3-9, NASB).

“But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was. But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man will be blessed in what he does” (James 1:22-25, NASB).

Also, many people seem to believe that they know a lot about children. Some of these people are called Christian child-rearing “experts.” These “experts” claim that all “misbehaviors” stem from children’s “sinful nature” or “defiance” and must be dealt with swiftly through spanking/hitting the children and the use of other harsh punishments. They clearly do not understand child development!

Understanding child development is crucial to disciplining children appropriately. When we see that God actually created children to go through each developmental stage, we can figure out kinder, more merciful ways of guiding them through each stage. The Bible says that children are blessings from God in Psalm 127:3. Jesus says we are to be like children in order to enter the Kingdom of Heaven in Matthew 18. Jesus raised the status of children.

We must take time to truly understand Scripture, the true character of God, and our children in order to effectively live our lives as Christ-like as possible. Knowledge may be power. But I believe understanding is where the true power lies!

Born Sinful?

June 12, 2015September 20, 2015 Stephanie G. Cox, M.S.Ed2 Comments

I believe the doctrine of original sin is man made like the doctrine of spanking is man made.

God created children to go through each developmental stage. Babies cry to communicate. Toddlers test boundaries and lack impulse control. Young children do not set out to sin until they are older.

God does not call children sinners. The way we view children is how they will behave. Many Christians seem to view children as “sinners” and “manipulative.” That’s Dobson’s view too as he calls them horrible degrading names in his books. This sets up an adversarial parent-child relationship.

Interestingly, God calls children blessings in Psalm 127:3. I view children as little people in need of help, guidance, and discipline (teaching).

When the focus is on cooperation instead of control, children cooperate. Children do better when we view them as God does. Young children are not capable of truly understanding sin. They even have a special knowledge of Who God is according to Matthew 25:11.

I do believe Jesus cried as a baby and screamed as a toddler because these are developmental behaviors. James 4:17 states, “Therefore, to one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin.” This can only apply to older children and adults who truly understand sin. “Moreover, your little ones who you said would become a prey, and your sons, who this day have no knowledge of good or evil, shall enter there, and I will give it to them and they shall possess it” (Deuteronomy 1:39).

God clearly says young children do not know right from wrong. It’s up to us to gently teach and guide them through each developmental stage.

The Forgiving Nature of Children

June 8, 2015September 20, 2015 Stephanie G. Cox, M.S.Ed

So many people believe children are born “sinful.” Yet, young children are quick to forgive whether we apologize to them or not. They don’t make us pay for our mistakes before they forgive us. Rather, they offer forgiveness freely.

If you ever watch young children playing, even with their peers, one minute they are fighting and the next minute they are best friends again. Young children are incapable of holding a true grudge against anyone. Yet, we often take advantage of their unconditional love and forgiveness by making them pay for their mistakes against us.

Even abused children will often forgive their abusive parents and will ask to go back home with them despite the horrible abuse. Perhaps this is one reason Jesus calls us to be like them in Matthew 18:3.

Forgiveness, despite the fact that it isn’t listed in Galatians 5:22-23, is a fruit of the Spirit. You need everything listed as a fruit of the Spirit in order to forgive. Children have most of these. The only reason they lack self-control is due to an immature brain. Calling something out of their control “sin” is not fair.

Children are forgiving in nature, therefore, they cannot be “sinful.” It’s only when we become adolescents and adults that we begin to struggle with forgiveness. I truly believe that being raised in punitive homes, especially Christian homes, where children must pay for their mistakes before they are offered forgiveness leads to this struggle most of us have with freely forgiving people as Jesus has freely forgiven us.

We need to help our children keep their forgiving natures by connecting with them and giving them our forgiveness without making them pay through punishment. This does not mean we don’t allow them to experience the natural and logical consequences of their actions. It means that we become more Christ-like and do not inflict pain on our children.

The nature of children is forgiving, not “sinfulness!”

Meeting Needs as God Intended

June 6, 2015September 20, 2015 Stephanie G. Cox, M.S.Ed

Proverbs 3:27-34
“Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due,
When it is in your power to do it.
Do not say to your neighbor, “Go, and come back,
And tomorrow I will give it,”
When you have it with you.
Do not devise harm against your neighbor,
While he lives securely beside you.
Do not contend with a man without cause,
If he has done you no harm.
Do not envy a man of violence
And do not choose any of his ways.
For the devious are an abomination to the Lord;
But He is intimate with the upright.
The curse of the Lord is on the house of the wicked,
But He blesses the dwelling of the righteous.
Though He scoffs at the scoffers,
Yet He gives grace to the afflicted.”

How many times do we fail to help each other when we have the ability to do so? The Church seems to be broken in this matter. It seems many churches tend to help those who meet their criteria and will promote their agendas. A certain church may only help outsiders in order to bring in more people to their building, yet, when a member has a real need, the church rejects that member. Other churches will only help people within their denomination. Yet, God clearly says to help one another both in the above verse and throughout the Bible.

“Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God” (Hebrews 13:16).

This is also a problem in the family unit. A hungry infant is made to wait to eat and drink in order to teach him/her “who is in control.” A tired toddler in need of snuggles is told to stop whining or is punished. A school-aged child needing to talk about an upsetting event is told not to interrupt a phone conversation.

Yes, there are times when children need to wait, but the introductory verse tells us to meet our neighbor’s need right away if possible. Yes, anyone, including our children, are our neighbors. Just think how much more connected we could be with our children and others if we would just put them first when possible! Children rely on us just as we rely on God. God never puts us on hold while He sees to other matters. He is always attending to our needs in some way.

Finally, the last part of Proverbs 3:27-34 says do not envy violent men. This applies to spanking/hitting children too. God hates violence. We see this in the teachings of Jesus. To strike a child is an act of violence.

Let us do our best to give others and our children what they need whenever possible. Putting them off and/or inflicting pain on children is not what God had in mind.

Today, Hear His Voice…

June 2, 2015September 20, 2015 Stephanie G. Cox, M.S.Ed

“Therefore, since it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly had good news preached to them failed to enter because of disobedience, He again fixes a certain day, “Today,” saying through David after so long a time just as has been said before, “TODAY IF YOU HEAR HIS VOICE, DO NOT HARDEN YOUR HEARTS.” For if Joshua had given them rest, He would not have spoken of another day after that” (Hebrews 4:6-8).

So many times we Christians cling to what we believe is Biblical truth when it’s not. If we choose not to question things we are taught, today, as the above verse says, we’ll miss out and our hearts will become hardened. That is scary to me, and I have been guilty of hardening my heart against God’s Truth. I thought I was remaining “firm in the Lord” when I was actually drifting from Him. What freedom I’ve felt when I humbled myself to Him and dug deeper into His actual Word to see Truth.

If you are a punitive parent, I encourage you to open your heart to God’s Truth. The God Who chose to come to Earth as Jesus to die for all of humanity’s sins. Please pay closer attention to Jesus’s actual teachings. Hone in on the Holy Spirit.

Imagine beginning to truly connect with your children and heal your relationships with them. The more we see our children as human beings, the more we understand that they have very real needs. By meeting those needs, many “behavior issues” can be resolved.

Also, imagine drawing closer to God as you learn to truly hear His voice which is the Holy Spirit in us. 1 John 4:1-2 states, “Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God.” God expects us to make sure we are really following Him. We cannot afford to simply take man’s word for it no matter how educated and godly that man seems to be.

Let’s do our best to follow after Christ and the Truth in all that we do. After all, Jesus said, “The Truth shall set you free.”

Our Interconnectedness

May 26, 2015September 20, 2015 Stephanie G. Cox, M.S.Ed

We are so interconnected a higher plane than we can truly understand. After all, we don’t even use much of our God given brain power because it’d overload us. But in Heaven, we’ll finally understand so much more than we do now. Our perceptions will be gone from what the Church and society has taught us, and we’ll be childlike again.

That is why God gets so upset when people hurt children because they know so much spiritually, but we ruin it. That makes me sick. Children know God, but our doctrines and punishments plant sin in them. Then they believe whatever we teach because they are so trusting & humble. If we could/would just cultivate their knowledge of God and show them that He is their loving Daddy, this world would be better. But, satan knows this and wants to ruin it as quickly as possible to make children either reject God or believe that He’s this mean, angry God that so many Christians make Him out to be.

The best way we can preserve our connectiveness with our children and God is to discipline them. Teach them how to act through modeling. Help them learn to deal with their negative emotions by validating them and provide them appropriate ways of getting out their upsets. One way to do this is giving them a calm me jar.

To make a calm me jar, fill a plastic bottle with water. Then pour glitter in. Duct tape the cap on and give it to them when they are upset. They can manhandle it. As they calm down, they can watch the glitter settle. You can talk to them about their feelings.

Some other ways to stay connected to our children and God is to set realistic limits and use natural and consequences with our children I will be posting more on limits and consequences in the future. I go in depth about them and other positive discipline strategies in my book, Gentle Firmness.

We are so blessed to have a loving God Who values relationships over anything else!

Beware of Distorting Scripture

May 25, 2015September 20, 2015 Stephanie G. Cox, M.S.Ed

2 Peter 3:14-18:

“Therefore, beloved, since you look for these things, be diligent to be found by Him in peace, spotless and blameless, and regard the patience of our Lord as salvation; just as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given him, wrote to you, as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction. You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, be on your guard so that you are not carried away by the error of unprincipled men and fall from your own steadfastness, but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.”

I see the Church today distorting the Scriptures a lot in order to fit their beliefs.

Some Christians claim that drinking alcohol is unBiblical when the Bible says alcohol is just fine as long as we don’t get drunk. They also claim that some natural remedies are satanic despite research showing their amazing healing and preventive abilities. Not to mention the fact that these remedies were used in the Bible.

Some Christians claim dancing is unBiblical, yet, David danced for joy in the Lord (2 Samuel 6:14).

Many Christians believe that babies are born “sinful,” yet, God calls them blessings (Psalm 127:3). Infants and young children even have a special knowledge of Who God is according to Matthew 25:11. Also, James 4:17 states, “Therefore, to one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin.” This can only apply to older children and adults who truly understand sin. “Moreover, your little ones who you said would become a prey, and your sons, who this day have no knowledge of good or evil, shall enter there, and I will give it to them and they shall possess it” (Deuteronomy 1:39). God clearly says children do not know right from wrong. Still, Christians will fire off a few verses out of the Book of Romans to say we are born “evil.” If that were true, young children, who lack impulse control due to immature brain development, would be horrible little people committing awful acts based on their fleshly impulses. Yes, I believe that due to satan and sin being in the world that we will all eventually sin and will need to come to Jesus for His amazing grace and forgiveness, but babies and young children do nothing that is purposely malicious or against God.

And then there are the Christian pro-spankers who adamantly claim that spanking/hitting children is absolutely Biblical. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard them say, “Well, I read my Bible” as they cite all of the “rod verses” from Proverbs that seem to promote spanking/hitting children at me. Yet a deeper look at the “rod verses” shows that they mean to discipline (teach, guide, correct) with authority and God’s Word instead of spank/hit.

And THAT’S the problem! As the introductory verses of this post teach, it is the untaught and the unstable who tend to distort Scriptures. Some do it unintentionally (the untaught) while others do it intentionally because they’re unwilling to let go of their beliefs (the unstable). I’ve been guilty of blindly taking Church doctrine as Biblical Truth because of not knowing better.

The Bible, while alive and active, is not meant to be read without looking at the historical context, cultural context, and the meanings of the original languages in which the Scriptures were written. And some Bible versions such as the New American Standard Bible (NASB) and the English Standard Version (ESV) are more accurate than the modern watered down versions such as the The Message, the New Living Translation (NLT), and even the New International Version (NIV) because church doctrine has ended up getting in these modern versions. Some parts of the Bible are meant to be taken literally while others are not. We shouldn’t be satisfied with just going with whatever the Church says it means based on the particular denomination that fits with our beliefs. As Samuel Martin often says, we must be very careful of “tip of the iceberg theology” as it distorts Scripture…The very thing 2 Peter 3:14-18 tells us not to do.