Recently things have been difficult with our 11, almost 12-year-old. A lot of it is preteen things, and things that puberty brings out. However, it really doesn’t make things any easier for her dad and me! Many times she asks us to do things with her friends, have friends sleepover, go somewhere, get her something, etc, etc! But when she treats us how she does, it makes her dad and I not want to do anything for her. If she can’t treat us with respect, why should we do these things that she clearly doesn’t deserve?

Grace, my friends…grace.

But she doesn’t deserve grace! I know that, and you know that! She and her friends had a birthday party to go to on a Saturday. I then allowed her two best friends to sleepover Friday night, and then take them all to the party. After that, I allowed her one friend to stay the night again so she could come to church with us the next day. But didn’t I just say how hard things have been with her and her attitude? Yes. And didn’t I say that it made me not want to do anything nice like this for her? Yes, again. So why did I? Grace, my friends…grace.

Grace: The love and kindness that God gives to people.

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God’s Grace

God is the one who has shown us what it truly means to have grace. He has given us grace by giving us a way to Him. The gift of salvation is something none of us deserve, however God is good and His grace is never ending! Because He has given us this grace, we can repent of our sins and live forever with Him! How wonderful is that! If the Lord decided to not have grace towards us, then we would all get what we truly deserved, an eternity in hell.

Have you ever been to the ocean and watched the waves come crashing in, over and over? I love standing there and just watching the waves come to the shore. To me, it’s powerful. They’re continual, never ending. Sound familiar? The same goes for the grace that the Lord gives to us! They are constantly coming and never ending!

Standing on the beach, and watching the waves come over and over, was a powerful reminder to me of what God’s grace is!

Grace to my Kids

I remember growing up, and my sisters and I would always give my mom a hard time. We would then ask for something, or to do something, and sometimes my mom would allow it to happen. She would then ask us if we knew why she was allowing it, even though we were being so bad. She would then say, “Grace is something that you don’t deserve. You don’t deserve to do this, but I am going to have grace and allow you to do it.” To this day, that is always on my mind. That is why I allowed our daughter to have her friends over! Even though she didn’t deserve it, I gave her grace and allowed her to have them over.

Just because we give grace doesn’t mean we need to be pushovers.

I believe a lot of times people take the idea of grace, and “overdo” it. Will I continue to show my daughter grace every single time she talks back to me, lies to me, or disobeys me? Absolutely not. I still have to be her parent and teach her that those things aren’t okay. But allowing her a one time sleepover was maybe the grace she needed to work on her attitude.

Sometimes, if we are too gracious, we can easily become pushovers. I’m not saying that we constantly need to give grace to the friend that talks about us behind our backs, or is rude, or tries to cause issues. I’m not saying we need to constantly show grace to the person who belittles you every time you are with them. No. Sometimes those are the people that you just need to let go of. If we are too gracious, people can see that as a weakness and use it against you.

Like everything, there is a balance. Once in a while, we can show God’s grace to someone, even when they don’t deserve it. However, there are other times when we need to just walk away from that person. We can still show them the love of God, but sometimes the grace needs to be limited. Just like our children, we can sometimes have the grace to allow them to do something that they don’t deserve, but that doesn’t mean it has to happen all the time. We still must parent them and teach them right and wrong.

I won’t say that I have figured out how to balance giving grace…

But I believe that it’s something that we must try to understand. God’s grace is beautiful, overwhelming, wonderful, unconditional, and so much more! Being able to truly understand His grace is something that I don’t believe we will ever fully understand. But I pray I can learn how to give grace to others, but to also protect myself, and stand up for the Lord. I want others to experience the unconditional grace, like the waves at the ocean! That’s the grace that I get to experience every day! I want my daughter to understand how beautiful grace is, but to know that the way she treats me isn’t pleasing to the Lord, and it needs to change.

I praise the Lord for His gift of grace, even though I don’t deserve it!