Love and Law

This is the talk that replays in my mind over & over. I understood some of the concepts on a deeper level as I contemplated it in the temple and thought about how our loving Father in Heaven fulfills his role as a parent. Some of the consequences he allows or even causes to happen must cause him the deepest anguish. I want parenting to be all about gentle love, happiness, and joy. I acknowledge the need to discipline, as I've studied it at a worldly perspective. But this talk has made me recognize the divine, eternal responsibility I have to withhold the laws of my home by enforcing consequences. Sometimes I just don't want to do it. It's easier is the short run not to do it. But now I'm seeing the grand significance of being "the meanie."

"In the midst of such stress, we must endure the reality that the straying of our loved ones will detract from our happiness, but it should not detract from our love for one another or our patient efforts to be united in understanding God’s love and God’s laws." We're not dealing with teenage rebellion or serious sin in our home, but this quote helped me grasp that sometimes the poor choices my children make & the consequences I have to enforce will decrease my level of happiness for a time, but that's just the way it is. I sometimes want to keep my emotions out of some aspects of parenting, but that's not really how it works.

Here are the quotes that sum this talk up for me:

"In teaching and reacting to their children, parents have many opportunities to apply these principles. One such opportunity has to do with the gifts parents bestow on their children. Just as God has bestowed some gifts on all of His mortal children without requiring their personal obedience to His laws, parents provide many benefits like housing and food even if their children are not in total harmony with all parental requirements. But, following the example of an all-wise and loving Heavenly Father who has given laws and commandments for the benefit of His children, wise parents condition some parental gifts on obedience."

"Real love does not support self-destructing behavior."

"There is no area of parental action that is more needful of heavenly guidance or more likely to receive it than the decisions of parents in raising their children and governing their families. This is the work of eternity."

I will discipline my children and hold them accountable because I love them.