Something New

We started something new this week, something Jesus put on my heart. A new way to help our boys understand accountability. A clearer picture of the repercussions of their decisions.

My boys like to wrestle. Or rather, Cubby likes to wrestle and Bear defends himself out of necessity. We average about four or five injuries a day.

So this new thing to help them understand consequences? Well it seems to be working so far...

Whenever the boys wrestle or fight over a toy, I usually separate them and immediately ask, "What is more important? This ____(insert toy, activity, food item) or your brother?"

They usually peek up at me from under their lashes before mumbling tearfully, "My brother."

And yet when an injury is involved, I usually move off to tend to the injured boy while the other boy waits in the time out corner until I return. The boy in time out misses what happens in our bathroom. He doesn't see his brother's tears as I tend and doctor a wound caused by selfishness and anger. He avoids the tears, the blood, the bandages. He stands in a corner thinking only of his own misery and isolation.

So we started something new. Hands that hurt must learn to heal.

Now when the boys wrestle and hurt each other, they must also help each other heal. Beyond a simple, "I am sorry," the boys must now tend each others wounds.

A few days ago, Cubby scratched Bear across the face, leaving behind an angry, bleeding cut. It breaks my heart when my sweet boy hurts his brother so viciously. His two year old heart is entirely self centered still and it aches to see this biblical evidence, glaring me in the face. None of us without sin, not even one. Not even our smallest, sweetest children. He is my son. Shared bone, shared blood, shared sin. And to watch him hurt my other son, pierces me. So I am taking the time to help him see and understand his part in all this.

I separate them. Comfort the Bear and lead them both into the bathroom. Cubby's eyes are wide as he watches me, waiting, for the punishment he expects to greet him. Anxious for his own fate and not sparing a thought for the brother with blood dripping down his face.

We sit the Bear down and I make Cubby hold the Bear's hand.

"Now," I say. "Help mend what you broke."

I guide him in cleaning the Bear's face, in applying salve, in unwrapping and placing the bandage. We wipe away the Bear's tears together and pray for him.

I oversee the apologies and forgiveness.

Then I ask the Bear to walk his brother to the time out corner. And Cubby serves two and a half minutes because he is two and a half years old. (The time is doubled if they refuse to apologize). Once the time out is done and the last tears are wiped away, we sit down together and talk.

Does this sound like a long arduous process?

It is.

And yet, I have to discipline myself to discipline them. To set aside whatever I am doing so that my boys can understand the depths of their sin so that they may one day appreciate the depths of grace and forgiveness. I sacrifice this time for them. The dinner burns, the laundry stays piled in the basket, the floor goes unswept. But they learn one day at a time to take responsibility for their actions.

At times, sin feels like an imposing mountain in my path. My children's sins tower even higher. I fret and worry over them. I doubt. I grieve.

Then Jesus gently reminds me that I can not save my children. He has done it for me. He has done it for them.

I often think of that precious verse, Isaiah 40:11

"He tends his flock like a sheperd:

He gathers the lambs in his arms

and carries them close to his heart;

He gently leads those that have young."

He leads me gently as I slowly push my young along, nudging them ever closer to the truth of grace and the hope they can have in this life.