Teens

Family Doesn’t Come Easily

Proverbs 17:17 NRSV
A friend loves at all times,
and kinsfolk are born to share adversity.

These days everything is throw-away. We love our fast food disposable society. Our cars break down; we buy new ones. Our homes need remodeling; we buy bigger ones. Our relationships sour; we find new “families.” We’ve lost an important sense of investment in life. Rather than invest, we throw out. And we fail to learn many important lessons when we live like this. We also may find ourselves on the short end of the stick when adversity strikes because we won’t have established the kind of relationships and skills that are necessary to persevere through the hard times.

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How Can We Help the Children of Addicts?

A. Understanding the Problems of Children from Addicted Families

    In the US, twenty million children are experiencing physical, verbal and emotional abuse from parents who are addicted to alcohol and/or drugs. This is tragic when we consider that childhood is the foundation on which our entire lives are built. When a child’s efforts to bond with an addicted parent are thwarted, the result is confusion and intense anxiety. In order to survive in a home devoid of healthy parental love, limits, and consistency, they must develop “survival skills” very early in life. In a chaotic, dysfunctional family, the lack of external control through consistent loving disciple results in an inability to develop internal discipline and self control. They learn not to depend on their parents to meet their needs – instead, it is all up to themselves. And, because they can’t trust their own parents, they become generally suspicious and mistrustful of all human beings. Yet, they are defenseless against the projection of blame and often feel responsible for parents’ addiction. They become “little adults” that feel compelled to accept responsibilities well beyond their years.

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Reflecting Christ as Parents

1 Corinthians 4:15b-17 RSV
For I became your father in Christ Jesus through the gospel. I urge you, then, be imitators of me. Therefore I sent to you Timothy, my beloved and faithful child in the Lord, to remind you of my ways in Christ, as I teach them everywhere in every church.

I have a sign in my classroom: “Fewer people with kids; more parents.” The crux of the sign is that simply having kids (begetting them, living with them in the same house, etc.) isn’t the same as parenting. Parenting is a responsibility, probably beyond all others, that requires that a parent sacrifice for their child: sacrifice time, sacrifice resources, sacrifice priorities.

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When Families Fight

Who in the entire universe knows you better than your family? Who do you spend at least the first 18 years together with on a daily basis (in functional families)? You eat together, talk together, go places together, worship together, pray together, have fun together, grow together and so on. If you’ve ever watched the television show 7th Heaven, you may be aware of their opening theme song:

“Mmmm, 7th Heaven, when I see their happy faces smiling back at me, 7th Heaven, I know there’s no greater feeling than the love of family. Where can you go, when the world don’t treat you right? The answer is home; it’s the one place that you find, 7th Heaven, mmmmm 7th Heaven.”

If you haven’t figured out by now, I’m a BIG fan of the show – watch it everyday on Vision TV. But they have a point; where in the world can you go when you are not treated right, if not your family?

I like 7th Heaven because it shows a fairly accurate representation of what a typical functioning family’s dynamics are like. Brothers and sisters fight amongst each other but when it comes to someone else interfering or hurting one of them, they all come together an support and lift each other up. They may fight for a few days, but eventually, they get past the hurtful words, betrayal or bribe and become that loving, caring and united family they desire to be.

In our world today, there are possibly more broken families than in our long history behind us. Divorce is more common now than in any other time and is more accepted. Children are abusing their bodies with cigarettes, alcohol, drugs, sex and self-abuse of other forms. Predators hungry for power and sex are everywhere and our justice systems offers very little justice for the victims of violence.

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Family Info & Help

Family relationships can be very challenging at times. It is important to approach difficulties prayerfully. The Christians in Recovery Web site is loaded with hundreds of pages of information and files designed to help you learn and to equip you.

You are not alone! God can and will help you overcome your situation.

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Don’t Make Me Your Project

What does love look like? It has the hands to help others. It has the feet to hasten to the poor and needy. It has eyes to see misery and want. It has the ears to hear the sighs and sorrows of men. That is what love looks like. Saint Augustine

“I hate feeling like I’m someone else’s project!”

I’d just finished sharing part of my story with the group. I expressed my gratitude for the people who wove the story of Relentless Grace and my belief that God sent this small circle of folks who refused to let me quit on life.

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