Now Can I?

This is a question that we hear fairly frequently in our house, and it's good because our kids know that they need to ask permission for certain privileges. Lately it's been on my mind for a different reason and has brought to my thinking an advertising slogan that is no longer current: "Have it your way."

How is it that my kids and their peers, who were born after this jingle had played out of the marketing scene, have adopted this mindset? It is bothersome to me that pop culture encourages us to chase the American Dream, grab all we can, have the best of everything, and expect to always have what we think we have a right to.

As much as I would like to think that we have programmed and protected our kids, the truth is that no one is immune. We can do and teach and practice at home to better prepare them to battle against the lies of entitlement, but until they wrestle with and reconcile what they see and hear with what they know to be true, my children are still at the mercy of society and the media.

Recently one of the kids went through a season of selfishness regarding computer usage. Somewhere, somehow my sweetie fell under the false assumption that their perceived need to be at the computer trumped the needs of all other family members as well as the need to respect the screen-time time limits. When reminded of said limits this child compounded the issue by arguing.

The outcome of a week's worth of this situation was the development of a special record-keeping notebook. Where as previously this child would have one "free" hour of screen-time each day, the new protocol gives no "free" screen-time and any "earned" screen-time must be recorded: clock-in/clock-out. The number of minutes spent on an approved activity (instrument practice, exercise, extra chores, extra studying) equals the number of minutes of screen-time earned.

Entitlement has also been spotted in some other actions and attitudes that sometimes surface in our home. Entitlement says it's okay to: annoy my sibling, call my sibling a name if they are annoying me, tattle on a sibling who has called me a name, go into a brother's room because he has something I want to look at, boss my sibling around because they are there or because they are doing something that I think they shouldn't be doing.

To counteract unhelpful attitudes we have instituted a system of community service (for which idea I owe thanks to a fellow foster mom.) Should a child commit an act of entitlement that affects a sibling, a chore is completed to make restitution for the offense. Just last week a brother was cleaning the bathroom counter for his sister and the dining room got a long overdue dusting.

Back to the bigger picture, beyond our family and our home, to the world into which I am preparing to launch my children.

How does the American Dream coincide with the Kingdom of God? Does it at all? Does God's Kingdom ask us to have a nice car (or two, or three), a big enough house, the latest cell phone, a larger television, yearly vacations? God provides us with all we need and many wants out of His great love; He wants to give us good gifts. Perversion of these blessings turns into entitlement. Gradually we come to the conclusion that all those gifts are ours by rights, that we are being treated unfairly should we have less than our neighbor.

Am I truly grateful for what God has provided? Do I take the time to recognize those blessings? Am I teaching my children to be thankful? Not enough, not nearly enough. But to turn the question on it's head: Now I can.