Don’t Practice in the Grocery Store is the title of chapter 24 in The Christian Parenting Handbook. In this chapter Dr Scott Turansky and Joanne Miller focus on parenting in public. The thing is parenting in public doesn’t begin in public, it begins at home. One of the quotes at the beginning of the chapter is “Kids who haven’t learned how to accept correction at home without a bad attitude will miserably fail the test when they have an audience.”
They share how “you don’t practice your discipline strategies in the grocery store. That’s the final exam! You practice in the kitchen, bedroom, laundry room, and backyard. Children need to learn how to to handle disappointment at home so they can accept a no answer in the check-out line.”
In this chapter they share this example from Mom and four year old Ricky:
My husband and I can testify to this method.
This is something that was always important in our home. To this day when we call our children’s names, the response from them is “Coming!” It’s not “what” or “why” or “wait a minute” or “let me finish” and it is definitely not no acknowledgment. The only acceptable answer is “Coming!”
There are three words that my husband and I are under firm conviction that our children clearly understand.
Stop
No
Their name.
This was not so we could execute tyrannical fear and power over them, it was because we knew that their ability to immediately respond to these three words could mean their very life. If our girls were chasing a ball out into the street and we yelled “Stop” they had to know to stop! Not ignore us. If our girls were about to stick a wire in a light socket they had to know that when we shouted “No” it meant “No”. If our girls heard us call their name they had to know that this meant come and come now. What if we saw danger approaching and we knew that any change in our demeanor would give away the fact that we knew danger was approaching and we needed that knowledge to remain unknown and we needed our girls by our side immediately? When we called their name they had to know to come to us, regardless of the reason.
I remember how this conviction was even more deeply rooted in me after I walked through the ghetto in Warsaw and through the death camps in Poland. These children’s ability to obey their parents, to be quiet when they said quiet, to come when they called their name, to stop when they said stop, to be accepting when they said no… could mean their life and the life of others.
Just because my family is not fighting a seen enemy does not mean we are not fighting one….
Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might. Put on the full armor of God, so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.
Ephesians 6:11-12
The conviction to these words came from the beginning with our girls. We didn’t baby talk with them. I hear parents quite often look at their little newly mobile children, just now crawling and beginning their adventure into the things of this world, and as they crawl toward danger, the parent picks them up and smiles and giggles as they baby talk to them and say, “No, No, that’s a No, No” and the baby just smiles and giggles back at the parent…
The parent has just made “NO” a game.
No is never a game.
The same thing happens with Stop…
Then they wonder why their now two, or three, or four, or fourteen year old has zero respect for their “No” or “Stop”
Moms and Dads…
But let your statement be, ‘Yes, yes’ or ‘No, no’; anything beyond these is of evil.
Matthew 5:37
********************************
But above all, my brethren, do not swear, either by heaven or by earth or with any other oath; but your yes is to be yes, and your no, no, so that you may not fall under judgment.
James 5:12
Dr Scott Turansky and Joanne Miller share how we get into relational patterns with our kids. Perhaps you are in the same rut with your kids that Ricky’s Mom was in. This book helps you identify that pattern, then gives you the practical tools you will need to change it. Or maybe you just needed encouragement that you were on the right path in some areas after all. This book will do that as well.
I am telling you, it’s really good stuff!
************************************************************
For those who might not be fully aware of the historical context of the death camps and ghetto mentioned in this post, please know that these camps were initiated by the German Nazi’s led by Adolph Hitler. I walked through the camps located in Poland in 2006 with the March of Remembrance and Hope:
The March of Remembrance and Hope (MRH) is a program designed for university and college students of all religions and backgrounds. The program takes place in mid-May, and includes a two-day trip to Germany, followed by a five day visit to Poland. The international MRH program was founded in 2001 by Dr. David Machlis of the United States and Eli Rubenstein of Canada, both of whom were involved in the March of the Living program.
During the trip students visit locations in Germany and Poland related to the Holocaust and other World War II genocides, including the site of the Wannsee Conference, and the former concentration/death camps of Auschwitz, Treblinka and Majdanek.
The purpose of the March of Remembrance and Hope is to teach students of various religious and ethnic backgrounds about the dangers of intolerance through the study of the Holocaust and other World War II genocides, and to promote better relations among people of diverse cultures.
Holocaust survivors also participate in the March of Remembrance and Hope program, sharing their painful memories in the very places in which their stories transpired. During the trip, the students also meet one of the Righteous Among the Nations, and learn of the heroic actions a minority of Europe’s population took to resist Nazi tyranny.