Fight for This Love

So my previous post, Fight the Good Fight, was all about those wonderful creatures I live with called boys, and the fact that they are such physical little beings. Physical little beings who constantly want to fight each other. In the words of Queen Elsa, I have learnt to 'let it go', when it comes to understanding these brotherly interactions. A mum of boys could literally spend 24hrs a day, 7 days a week, asking them to stop and trying to work out why they do it. And I just haven't got that kind of time or patience. So for the most part, I ignore it until one of them has had too much and needs my intervention. Other days, I send them out into the garden to do it, because I have double glazing and can't hear them. Then there are those hours/days when they are literally on a ban from touching each other, or even being in the same room as each other. 

With most parenting which goes on in this house, we aim to go for 'selfless not fair'. We want them to prefer one another, to put the other person's needs above their own. If they're going to fight for anything, we want them to fight to love one another, like it says in John's gospel. In fact, it doesn't just say it, it commands it.  “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another." John 13v34

With anything you want for your kids, they will mostly learn how to do it, (or indeed not do it), firstly, from the example you set them and secondly, from constantly training them in it. As well as anything I say to my little lot, I know they are looking at my actions too. They are looking & listening to see how 'selfless not fair' I am with the husband and with others in my life. There's no point really in even teaching them to be selfless, if all they see modelled is selfishness. This can be really annoying or graciously humbling, (whichever way you choose to look at it), when you just really want your husband to put your needs first of course. But I have learnt along the way, that God does seem to use the little people in my life to point out some/all of my weaknesses.

One of the best things about the above verse, is that we are to love one another, because Christ first loved us. As a mum, I have to remember God's amazing selfless love for me, in order to love my kids better. His love is ever so patient, ever so kind, ever so pure. What an example we have!

And then comes the training...the drip, drip, drip of parenting. If you don't plant a seed, and cultivate it, how will it grow? At the moment, one of the ways we as a household are working on how we can love one another, is in the way we speak to each another. We have been working on it forever, and I presume we will continue with this little 'heart changing project' until....well, I can't see an end ever coming. But as Cheryl Cole would say, "Anything that's worth having, is sure enough worth fighting for". And I am fighting for my kids to love one another. (Hands up if you're singing along...we've gotta fight, fight, fight, fight, fight for this love...)

So we discussed phrases we use that others don't like, and phrases others use that upset us. Then we practised other ways of saying those things. My tone is a constant that I have to work on, as it can be naggy or impatient or snappy or grumpy...I could go on. So if we're all working on it together, that helps me and it helps them. It's especially humbling when they say, "Mum, I didn't really like your tone then". Of course, I want to pick them up and throw them out of the window at this point, but seeing as they follow the example I set them, they would just think I had initiated a bundle. 

The verse I went for, in training this is 
"Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell in unity". Psalm 133v1
I want my boys to dwell in unity with one another. Are they going to stop bundling each other? I doubt it. But can I train their hearts to love one another? Well, I hope so.