All About Families Newsletter August 16, 2005 Norman Bales, editor *BOOK REVIEW (Part Two) * /_Why Christian Kids Rebel/_, by Dr. Tim Kimmel. Nashville, Tennessee, W Publishing Group, a division of Thomas Nelson, 2004, pb, 255 pages. $14.99. The subtitle of Dr. Kimmel’s book is “Trading Heartache For Hope.” If you’re the parent of a rebellious child, I’m sure you’d like to experience that outcome. But how do you make it happen? No one has all the answers, but we shouldn’t be afraid to work at solving the problem. Tim Kimmel’s book can help. Today I’m going to confine my review to a single chapter, which helps us establish a basic understanding of how we need to function as parents when we’re confronting difficult choices with our children. He calls it “A Prodigal Primer,” and as you might imagine, he regards Luke 15:11-32 as a working model for parent-child relationships when rebellion occurs. I regard it as the core of Kimmel’s work. Basically the story involves three people: (1) the prodigal son, (2) the waiting father, and (3) the disgruntled older brother. Kimmel set the story up by identifying four different relationship styles that parents usually choose when their children rebel. *1. **The clueless parent.* None of us would ever admit to being that kind of parent, but some parents don’t seem to pay attention to what’s going on. Maybe they’re preoccupied. Perhaps they find it so painful, they avoid dealing with the problem.** * * *2. **The EMT parent.* EMT stands for Emergency Medical Technician. They are the people who race down the streets and highways to rescue victims of some form of trauma. EMT parents constantly involve themselves in rescuing their children from painful consequences. The mom who takes forgotten lunches to school typifies the EMT parent. Kimmel says they also, “… pay speeding tickets, buy birth control pills, fix wrecked cars, bail their kids out of jail, and attack people who are trying to hold their child accountable.”** * * *3. **The Special Forces parent. *In a military environment, Special Forces teams achieve their objectives with extreme measures. Some people attempt the same approach to parenting. Their parenting style is characterized by threats, intimidation, punishment, and ultimatums. Sometimes the children of such parents are compliant in the presence of their parents, and rebellious as soon as a parent’s back is turned.** * * *4. **Grace-Based parents. *When Kimmel talks about grace, he’s not discussing that form of grace, which Bonhoeffer labeled “cheap grace.” He’s not discussing grace without natural consequences. He’s not describing a form of parenting without discipline, and he’s not advocating a home without rules. Basically he’s thinking about a different attitude toward rules and discipline. “In grace we find a breath-of-fresh-air balance between rules and relationships.” “Punishment is primarily about payback. Discipline is designed to correct.”** * * Kimmel sees grace-based parenting modeled by the father in the story of the prodigal son. His parenting style surfaces at several different points in the story. * /He doesn’t interfere when his younger son demands his inheritance, and makes arrangements to go into the far country. /That’s hard to do if you are an EMT parent, but Jesus told the story of a father, who lets it play out. Of course the boy wakes up when the money runs out, and his circumstances become loathsome. The once proud son, anxious to claim his perceived rights, now returns to his father in humility. * /The father welcomes the boy back home. /He sees the boy in the distance, and runs to meet him, something that was not done by an older man of that time. Kimmel notes that the father is “not preoccupied with image control.” A Special Forces parent would impose conditions of acceptance. That doesn’t happen. / / /* He celebrates his son’s return. / He throws a party for the boy. There’s no evidence that he minimizes or ignores the son’s rebellious behavior. He is not a clueless parent. He simply forgives, and rejoices * /He deals with the sibling rivalry. /A clueless parent wouldn’t have noticed the other boy. He would have been too busy partying to worry about the pouting older sibling. Actually the father had two rebellious children. One rebelled with his actions, and another rebelled with his heart. But when the father speaks with the older brother, he does not scold. He simply makes an attempt to put things in perspectives. Based on the Luke 15, Kimmel suggests five rules for dealing with the prodigals in our lives. 1. *Avoid the guilt trap. * Most of us beat ourselves up when a child goes astray. We need to own up to our mistakes, and we can be sure that we have made some, but God is in the forgiveness business. If God can forgive a child, surely he can forgive a parent. We need to accept that. *2. **Pray, Pray, Pray, Pray, Pray. *The story makes no mention of the father’s praying, but you can be sure he did. ** * * *3. **Don’t be afraid to let sin run its course. *When reasoning, rules, regulations, and pleading don’t work, don’t be afraid to say, “O. K. If that’s the way you want it, you can take the path you have chosen, but you will have to accept the consequences.”** * * *4. **Once they repent, restore their status. *It’s difficult not to be angry. You were hurt, and hurt deeply. Grace-based parenting is interested in forgiving and restoring relationships. It is not about evening the score. There will be natural consequences, but there is no need for you to impose consequences of your own.** * * In our next installments, we’ll comment on Dr. Kimmel’s use of the /Rocky /movies to help us understand how to deal with rebellious children. * * ADDRESSES Southern Hills Church of Christ 9080 Southwood Drive Shreveport, Louisiana 71118 (318) 686-2190 E-mail: Norman Bales: nlbales@... Ann Bales: Ann@... Mikal Frazier: <mikalfraz@...> "Jim Bales" <jbales@...> Web: <http://www.allaboutfamilies.org/> <http://www.sohills.org> subscribe <allaboutfamilies-subscribe@...> unsubscribe <allaboutfamilies-unsubscribe@...> archives <http://associate.com/groups/allaboutfamilies/> * *