I Rarely Cry, But When I Do…

I cried last week. My daughter looked surprised at me and told me she never sees me cry. But I guess I broke my record.

I’m still struggling with the raising of my son. I didn’t know I would struggle so. I didn’t know there was going to be a process. My daughter was so easy. She just followed and copied everything I did. This isn’t okay for my son. He’s pushing back. He’s asserting himself at times. And that’s what he did last Sunday.

We were coming home from church and he critiqued me. I was having a good day too. I was feeling happy and content and out of no where he threw a pot shot at me. I told him that wasn’t true and he wouldn’t relent. He argued back and said it was. My feelings were hurt. I turned to my husband and asked him if he was going to intervene. He did. He questioned my son. My son gave me a sarcastic sorry and that was it.

We came into the house. My sister and her family were staying with us. I burst into tears and had to run upstairs to let go of my grief. My husband chased me up the stairs (remember, I don’t cry often) to console me. I told him, that our son needed to make up to me. He said he would tell him. It took me a few minutes, but I managed to pull myself together.

My son gave me another (what I thought) flippant apology. I was still angry with him. I told him God puts a high premium on obedience to your parents. He actually says your life depends upon it. I have reminded him in the Bible that if you looked at your parents wrong, a kid got stoned to death. And not the “fun” kind of stoned either!

I spent the day angry with my son. I ignored him for most of the day and enjoyed my time with my sister. I waited for him to come and give me a sincere apology, but he didn’t.

We went to bed and my son made no move to make amends with me. When I woke up in the morning, I went downstairs. My sister and her family were down there AND my son. I looked at my son, in front of everybody, and said, “You never really apologized to me. You need to give me a proper apology.” My son looked embarrassed. He needed to be. He got up and asked me if I wanted him to get on his knees to say he was sorry. I said yes.

I stood at the bottom of the stairs while my son kneeled down in the middle of the room, in front of my sister and her family and said he was sorry. I stood there, watching my son become more of a man, than he was the day before. He had kneeled on our hardwood floor, with nothing between his knees and the hardness and said he was sorry. He got up from the floor and said he needed to give me a hug and he did. He came over to me and hugged me hard, his long arms wrapping around me. (Hugs from my son are very infrequent now).

You might think I made a big deal out of nothing. I don’t think I did. You might think I was wrong for calling out my son the way I did. I don’t think I was. This boy. This man needs to learn to be a man. Part of that is honoring your parents. If he doesn’t learn it now, when will he? To respect, first, your parents, will help you to respect others. If the Lord tarries, someday my son will have a wife. He will need to honor and respect her. He will need great humility. God puts a high premium on humility too. God is opposed to the proud.

I could have told my son that he didn’t need to do that. But I think he needed that. We as parents, have a grave responsibility in raising sons. I just saw on the news how a young girl got stabbed in her bedroom and the police think it was her boyfriend. She was only sixteen. What kind of boy, stabs his young girlfriend to death? I think the kind that didn’t have anyone telling him he needed to apologize when he was wrong. We’re raising my son to be a knight, to be a man. I think he had a little lesson on Sunday when he made me cry. I hope he did.