Have you ever heard the saying, "There was a little girl who had a little curl right in the middle of her forehead. When she was good she was very very good and when she was bad she was horrid."
Aside from the fact that my little Kate has no curls anywhere near her forehead, this pretty much sums her up in a nut shell.
She is a very good girl when she wants to be, and she knows exactly how to get into trouble when she wants to. In the past week, we've had bed time battles, bath time battles, don't hit your sister battles, no you can't talk to mommy that way battles, and pretty much everything else you can imagine in between.
I am not perfect and I have to admit that I lose my temper and get extremely frustrated and angry in the midst of many of these battles. Kate has learned how to apologize (and yes how to use an apology to try to get out of trouble as well), largely because her mother has had to say I'm sorry for losing my temper a time or two.
After the apologies and tears are over, it is amazing how quickly Kate wants to be "friends" again. We can go from time out to sharing bath time tea in a matter of minutes. In fact it was in those minutes tonight that I reflected on how quickly I too go from blood boiling to choosing to change my tone to something softer and lighter and have fun with my girl.
God's forgiveness is like that. It doesn't matter how often or how badly we mess up, he welcomes us back with open arms, easily puts aside those things that drove a wedge between us, forgives us, loves us. Without ever having one of those moments as a parent, I think it is difficult to really understand how God forgives and forgets. But when you understand as a parent that your role is to teach right and wrong and to help your child to learn how to control her behavior, you realize that she is still learning, that you shouldn't take the behavior personally, and that discipline without love and acceptance and grace is useless at best, dangerous at worst.
