Mailbag: Rick, my husband left me four years ago and is now living with another woman. I don’t want my kids spending time with him until he straightens out his life. Both he and his girlfriend are a bad influence on my children. How should I respond to him and my kids?
I’m sure your kids are struggling a great deal because of the split of their family and there are a lot of emotions going on inside of them. Honestly, there is no “right way” to answer your question. Each situation is different and you have to understand the dynamics of the situation, pray to God, seek sound advice and do what you understand to be right.
It is very humble and transparent of you that you would seek my counsel. Based on your limited description, here are a few bullet thoughts. Please remember, email correspondence is not the best medium to interact with questions of this nature. So much can be missed.
- The bottom line is that your kids need to see and spend time with their daddy. No matter what he has done or what he is doing, he is there daddy. No parent is perfect and it will serve the children if you make the best effort to have them with their dad, or at least make sure you’re not the one hindering a potential relationship.
- Never speak negatively of their dad. Besides it being gossip and slander, it will also create an unnecessary tension in the hearts of the children.
- I would seek to “re-train” your children’s consciences to the place where they can have a relationship with their dad, while not condoning his sin. This not only applies to their relationship with their dad, but with any human.
- I’d take the Savior’s approach with the woman in adultery, as it pertains to those living in sin: “He who is without sin, cast the first stone.”
- Your children can make it clear they do not approve, but they can still have a relationship. Don’t we do this with all our relationships at some level?
- I have a relationship with a lot of people living in all kinds of sin, e.g. gay lifestyle, adultery, drunkenness, you name it. I don’t practice or condone any of these sin patterns, but I do not alienate myself from them. To alienate is the mindset of those who hold to the contrived doctrine of “separation” rather than a Christian mindset. It is anti-Gospel.
- The essence of the Gospel is Christ coming to the unworthy, useless sinner. Christ had relationships with these kinds of people, though it is clearly understood he did not imbibe or condone their sinfulness.
- I would remind your kids of the Gospel. We were all like this lady friend of your ex-husband, in that none of us were righteous, but yet God pursued us. I do not want to treat others in a way God did not treat me. If God looked on me the way some people look on other sinners, he would never have regenerated me.
- If your children draw a “relational line” in the sand, which says we will see you if you get rid of her, he may (and probably will) choose her and the kids will be the big losers. It will take them years, as adults, to wrestle through their dad’s “rejection”. It is hard enough already, as you know, but this will make it worse.
- It can come across as manipulation and/or conditional love: we will spend time with you if you conform to our standard of righteousness. You would be asking an unbeliever to act like a believer, or at least to act like a believer in this way. He is selfish, blind, ignorant, self-deceived, lustful, proud and immature. To separate will probably backfire on you.
- I would model Romans 2:4: it is the “kindness of God that leads to repentance“. I would give him what he would not expect, i.e. I love you, but don’t condone. It is easy to not condone and reject, but counter-intuitive to not condone and love at the same time.
- Find a trusted friend to help you walk through this. And, by all means, talk with your pastor, the one who is charged to care for your soul.
- Guard your heart from the temptations of bitterness & revenge. I do not read this into anything you have said, but thinking that if I went through what you went through, certainly I would be tempted to act in an anti-Gospel way, either through bitterness or revenge.
I trust my words have not been a hard blow to you or a burden for you to carry through. I’m certainly not judging you or thinking negative of you. I feel for your situation. You are a mom. You are trying to figure out what to do. You love your kids. And you are humble to ask me for advice. I respect that.
I’m a parent. I understand. One of the things I want to do is protect my kids from the sinfulness of the world. I realize the sinfulness of this world is right before them. And they will have to interact with it. But I don’t want them to have to interact with it at such a young age.
Budget some sin into their lives
However, it would be unwise to totally shelter them from the world. I’ve seen parents do this and when their kids become older they are drawn to the world. It’s a bad idea. The best time to budget some sin into your kid’s life is while they are with you so you can bring interpretation and clarity to their world.
Disappointment at a young age takes more prayer, parenting skill and God’s grace than any other parenting situation. And your kids are in an unending season of inevitable disappointment.
Divorce will be part of their life, all their life. It seems unfair, but God’s grace is still bigger. I would work very hard in teaching your kids about how to live out the Gospel in a mean, unkind and uncaring world. And the first place to start is with their dad.
Go back to the Gospel
The Gospel is God loving us and pursuing us while not condoning our sin. He did not reject us. It was his kindness that led you and me to repentance. Your kids have an incredible opportunity before them. And if their consciences are weak because of the situation, I would work to retrain their consciences.
The truth is, dealing with unsavory people, will be repeated throughout their lives and if they learn this lesson now, it will serve them very well in the future.
To live in a sinful world, not be overcome by the sinful world while being able to impact the sinful world is Christian maturity, which is the goal for not only you, but for your kids.
Read these related articles:
- How Should My Kids Respond to My Ex-Husband?
- Marriage, Divorce & Me
- Divorced Kids Blame Themselves for Parent’s Blunder
- Facts Get Lost in Our Interpretation
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