Galatians 5:13

13 For you have been called to live in freedom, my brothers and sisters. But don’t use your freedom to satisfy your sinful nature…..

1 Peter 2:16

16 For you are free, yet you are God’s slaves, so don’t use your freedom as an excuse to do evil.

After an excruciatingly long and demanding homeschool year, I began looking forward, with great anticipation, to some free time in our kids and my schedule. With that in mind, I updated our children’s chore charts, added extra time each day for them to engage in their privileges (TV, Wii, iPad, computer games, etc.) and pushed back their bed times to be more conducive with our new summer hours. I was somewhat surprised however, when my act of generosity was met with “uhgggh….grrrr……we STILL have to do chores?!? We can’t watch TV ALL day??? We can’t stay up ALL night!?!” You would have thought I was a harsh taskmaster, refusing to feed them, and demanding they work 10 hours days in 100% humidity cropping tobacco- for no pay.

Later in the week, as I was chatting with one of our children, she admitted she was still mad at me for taking away “her freedom.” She had expected that during the summer she could do whatever she wanted- whenever she wanted. Was it too much to ask after working hard on her chores and school all year? On the surface, no. But I explained to her that true freedom isn’t the absence of rules or laws, for without any parameters, there would be chaos. I then gave a short lesson about the Israelites constantly sinning against God and His reason for sending the 10 commandments through Moses. It wasn’t because He was being a harsh taskmaster. No! God gave His children laws to provide safe, healthy parameters to live life to the full! He knew that if they lived according to His design, they would experience true freedom, in Him.

And so, as you may have guessed, my parameters for the summer still stand. Sure, I am open to negations, if respectful arguments are brought forward for consideration. But, I refuse to allow our children to live their lives as slaves to sin. Instead, while they are still within our care, I want to train them to become God’s slaves, because I know true freedom is only found by living a life submitted to Him- and His parameters.