11.4-Mercy is the basic building block of a mentally healthy family.

11.4-

Families with generations of mental health and excellence have a couple of things going for them.  Good genetics and good environment.  I want to just thank God for the good genetics I have inherited. 

 Now regarding the environment,  I believe it needs to be an environment of mercy.  As for myself I have messed up many times while in my mother and dad’s home.  They told me their concerns.  They warned me about the consequences of my behavior.  They extended mercy to me and told me by words and actions that mercy was the way God had dealt with them and the way they intended to deal with me.

Mercy.

We remember how much mercy God has given to us.  As teenagers we start to make our own decisions.  At about age twelve we have a new kind of freedom given to us by our parents.  There are new opportunities to chart some new paths compared to our parent’s expectations for us.  Some of these might be a departure to a higher and better life for ourselves.  Some of them might be the same type of life just in a different field.  Carpenters may have kids that want to become shepherds.  Even at age twelve there is an opportunity for kids to hang with a different group than the family.  One could choose at twelve to hang out with a professor of astronomy or hang out with a nature biologist or a fantastic coach.  A twelve year old might choose to hang out with a self-destructive crowd as well.  Big choices are given to twelve year old kids.   

This was true 2,000 years ago and is true now.

Luke 2.

⁴¹ Every year Jesus’ parents went to Jerusalem for the Festival of the Passover. ⁴² When he was twelve years old, they went up to the festival, according to the custom. ⁴³ After the festival was over, while his parents were returning home, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but they were unaware of it. ⁴⁴ Thinking he was in their company, they traveled on for a day. Then they began looking for him among their relatives and friends. ⁴⁵ When they did not find him, they went back to Jerusalem to look for him. ⁴⁶ After three days they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. ⁴⁷ Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers. ⁴⁸ When his parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us like this? Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you.”
⁴⁹ “Why were you searching for me?” he asked. “Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?”^{[f] 50} But they did not understand what he was saying to them.
⁵¹ Then he went down to Nazareth with them and was obedient to them. But his mother treasured all these things in her heart. ⁵² And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man.

When you add the idea of a child getting a driver’s license and a job paying him/her $150/week you can imagine the good and bad decisions that can come with that.

Now our children are not really ours.  They are heaven’s gift to live with us for a while, but they are not technically, ours.  They are created in the image of God and are a gift to the parents and the family and the world.  We must release them to be all they can be.

A cult is different from a relationship with Jesus is that Jesus is shaping a person into being who they are meant to be, not what the parents are the “religion” wants them to be.

Sad story on television today of a woman who introduced her daughter to a group and joined her in attending what she thought was a business excellence and leadership business.  

 It turned into a surrendering her child to the mental manipulation and brainwashing of her beautiful daughter into a very sick, wounded soul.  She was being twisted into being skinny and undernourished and abused sexaully by the cult leader.  She was devastated.

Larry Wishard

11.2.17