Doing your own thing.

Ephesians 6:9 And masters, treat your slaves in the same way. Do not threaten them, since you know that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no favoritism with him.

OK - I'm a horrible guy. Remember the story of the soccer ball? Well, there was only one of the two balls in the bag. I found the other ball at home. I think I'm going to have to make that right.

Last time I said, you can't play favorites, you have to be consistent. You can't treat your favorite player one way (or your "good kid") and then treat your least favorite player another.

So - today, it is clear that I cannot live by a different standard than I expect of others. That includes my kids. Is it OK for me to take a cookie from the cookie jar and then yell at them if they take one? Of course! NOT! And that is the point. 

In our home, we work together and we play together. This is divinely inefficient. We could do so much more if we didn't overlap our time so much. But we find good fellowship in conversations around all our events. 

But the other thing is we develop consistency. Everybody is with each other and can see that we are getting the same opportunities. There is nobody in our house saying "That's not fair! HE got to have screen time! HE got to have Jell-o! HE got to sleep in!" No, everybody knows they are on the same playing field. 

That includes Mom & Dad. We try very hard not to use the words "BECAUSE I SAID SO!" because we are not exerting monarch authority over them. In emergency situations, we may say "NOT NOW! LET'S TALK LATER!!" In which case our kids know that we are pressed/stressed and they will give us the space we need to get back to an even keel.

Another place we do this is TV & Movies. Our house tries to play to the least common denominator. Meaning, we don't allow the 8 year old to see PG-13/TV14 shows. We attempt to limit the exposure of the rest of the kids as well. As parents, we limit our exposure. 

Consider the future conversation with your kids... "So - you guys saw Vampire Academy? Isn't that the one that says 'School Sucks!?' What's it about? Why did you see it? Can we see it?" Yeah... we just aren't going to go there.

I mean, you have to ask yourself if the culture today isn't what it used to be, and you like what it used to be a whole lot more, then why would you want to embrace this culture today? Sounds like the peer pressure of old.

So, are you consistent with yourself like you expect of others?