Parenting proves challenging in the best of circumstances. Even the healthiest, most well-adjusted parent faces crises of doubt, exhaustion, and failure.
via Brian Smithson, Creative Commons
But most of us aren’t completely healthy, are we? Most of us carry baggage from our own imperfect childhoods, adolescent traumas, and adult heartaches. And for those of us who grew up in rule-based churches or families, the roots of legalism can run deeper than we imagine. Unaddressed, they can wrap around our children and their children to the third or fourth generation.
The Rule of Law
We all want to believe that we would never do anything terrible in this world, nothing to hurt the ones we love, nothing to be ashamed of when we sit wrinkled and rheumy in our rocking chairs with our lives spread out behind us. We all wish for our lives to go unendingly from strength to strength.
We don’t all get what we wish for.
I spent most of my life in a Bible cult. When that church fell apart six year ago, I had to come to grips with my own distorted view of God, my legalistic worldview, and a brittle sense of self which relied heavily on rule-following to feel secure.
Though outwardly I appeared normal, inwardly I was wrapped in chains.
I also had to live with the pain I had caused family members and friends as a result of shunning them in our church’s misguided belief that all who were not part of our tiny fellowship were guilty of apostasy. I vowed that I would never hurt anyone like that again.
Progress, though slow, seemed steady. Over time, I laid aside many of the most destructive beliefs from my former church. But one area remained deep-rooted and surprisingly resistant to change. It was the idea that God is fundamentally a rule-maker and that his love is conditioned primarily on my ability to do what is right. I felt like a child always cowering beneath the upraised hand of an angry parent. This conception of God expresses itself through a worldview of legalism.
When Legalists Become Parents
I thought marriage and family would provide a sanctuary from my own legalistic past. I wanted to believe that my own hurtful church background would soften me as a parent. In some ways it has. But I also found that parenting seemed to catalyze my inner legalist. Small children—besides being cute—are messy, needy, and brilliant at provoking adult areas of weakness.
Here are some of the legalistic chains which can make me feel locked-up in my parenting:
- Overreaction to disobedient or defiant behavior, evidencing a deeper well of hurt and insecurity in my own life.
- Expectation that my children should behave as tiny adults, rather than in developmentally appropriate ways.
- Ascribing moral significance to accidents or disorder, which results in intolerance for messiness, noise, or chaos.
- Paranoia which expresses itself in an unreasonable fear that my children will get hurt and results in a visceral need to control my surroundings.
- Easily scandalized by mistakes, accidents, or spills, with the understanding that someone is always at fault and it is important to ascribe blame to balance the moral ledger.
- Believing that there is only one right way to do something. This results in me being inflexible and feeling defensive when my wife suggests alternative ways to parent.
- Focusing on efficiency rather than on quality of time spent together.
- Task-oriented approach to each day, rather than a joyful focus on relationships.
- Feeling guilty, incompetent, and ashamed of my abilities as a parent.
- Expecting my children to obey unwritten rules, then disciplining them when they transgress these unstated expectations.
- Lecturing young children at a theological and psychological level far beyond their ability to comprehend.
- Using spiritual terms to justify harsh behavior.
- Believing that obedience is the most important job of children, rather than learning and growing.
- Believing that creating moral, obedient children is the most important job of a parent, rather than modeling Christ-like behavior and providing a safe place for children to feel loved, to learn, and to grow.
It’s a pretty miserable list, isn’t it? When you read it, does it make you feel safe, loved, and accepted? Or does it make you feel fearful, hesitant, and driven to perform?
Breaking the Chains of Legalistic Parenting
My own parenting is a work in progress. I don’t have all the answers. But as a recovering legalist, certain truths have helped me start to break the chains which once bound me.
- Understand that my parenting is a mirror of my relationship with God. I will treat my children largely in the same way I feel God treats me. Do I understand that I am fully loved and accepted by God through Jesus Christ and his finished work on the cross? Or do I feel I have to earn his approval every minute of the day?
- Nothing comes out of me which isn’t already inside of me. When I overreact or have fits of rage, it is not an anomaly. It is rooted in fundamental misconceptions I have about God and about my place in the world.
- Transforming my worldview takes time and regular attention. Worldview is a muscle which can be exercised or atrophied. What I read, what I watch, who I talk with, and my own self-talk provide the background noise to my life. Are these channels based on grace and truth, or lies?
- Listen to my spouse. Parenting is a partnership, not a dictatorship.
- Apologize to my children when I sin against them. Admit that I was wrong. Tell them why I was wrong, and why I need Jesus to help me. Ask for their forgiveness. Do it as many times as I sin against them, even if it feels humiliating. Even if I cry. Tears are the most honest apology.
- Write down the behaviors or circumstances which trigger my internal legalist. Identify them clearly, then look for them in real life and come up with alternative ways to act. This preparation allows me to respond to situations rather than reacting with my legalistic defaults.
- Realize that my primary job as a parent is to keep my children safe and to model Christ to them. Love covers over a multitude of sins.
- Seek out resources which can help me understand developmentally appropriate activities, tasks, and disciplines for my children. Look at both Christian and non-Christian resources.
- Consider what my child’s primary perception of me must be. Is it of a father or mother full of the joy of the Holy Spirit, fun-loving, consistent, self-disciplined, and humble? Or is it of a brittle dictator, prone to fits of rage, rigid adherence to rules, and an unsmiling view of life?
- Accept God’s grace for me. I am learning to parent just as my child is learning to be a child. We all make mistakes. God planned to put my children in my home. He wanted them to have me as their parent. With Christ’s help, I am the best parent for God’s purpose in my child’s life.
Conclusion
Legalism is a joyless worldview whose roots run deep. It is a spiritual stronghold which we can overcome only with God’s help. But there is hope for legalistic people who become parents. Our faulty worldview does not have to curse our own children or their children after them.
By recognizing our problem, seeking God’s help, rehabilitating our thinking, and humbling ourselves before our spouse and our children, we can break the chains of legalism and live the free and joyful life that God intended for our blessing.
Liberty for Captives 
Oh, boy. Thanks, Steve. I resemble those remarks.
🙂
Thanks Steve, as a parent who is now a year out of an Abusive Church Culture, this article has hit home at a very opportune moment.
Thank you for that. It resonated with me in an alarming way. Awareness is a good place to begin, I’d say.
I am 30 years out of the abusive church I grew up in but only now realising how much it has affected me and how much of it I carried into my parenting 😦 I’m glad I found this blog. Thank-you
sounds like you may be an estj.. this sounds strikingly similar to my dads legalistic parenting behavior that has really destroyed me to ever trust him or god as loving.
Well, I’m actually an ISFJ, but legalism tends to look pretty much the same no matter what your natural personality type.
interesting, I guess I thought that due to their very critical nature it was the same thing, I hadn’t distinguished it, now i see it is two separate things. thanks.
Apologize to my children when I sin against them. Admit that I was wrong. Tell them why I was wrong, and why I need Jesus to help me. Ask for their forgiveness. Do it as many times as I sin against them, even if it feels humiliating. Even if I cry. Tears are the most honest apology.
be careful with that… if someone did that to me as a child I would feel like their burden and their problems are mine.. its really seems a bit inappropriate, you should probably explain what “why I need Jesus to help me” means, because they are are a child.. they don’t need to be burdened with the why you need Jesus.. that puts a bit of guilt on them, seems manipulative crossing the line.
What would you do?
I have an adult daughter who we just discovered that her boundary and wall building behavior we have not been able to figure out the last year and a half has to do with the influence of her finance and specifically his family. I just now realized, shame on us, for not researching before, that the church she attends when she went to Grad school is related to Great Commission Church and her boyfriends parents actually were the church plant that started the church when them and a few other couples graduated from Clemson and were members of the Great Commission Church while in college. They graduated and came to Columbia area to plant a church. That was back in the late 70’s and early 80’s that they were in college and in my research on the GC, I realize I can use any advice on anything to read….She plans to walk down the aisle with him in two weeks. She had not allowed us to have her new phone number and will not talk to us. Got a few emails going and she won’t even respond back now. She has been a great distance away since she started grad school 2 years ago and we didn’t see her much and we are not the type of parents that are busy in our kids lives and have to talk to them all the time…Husband and I have been seeing a biblical counselor the last 6 months and he understands where we are because he had a sister who was at one time involved in the GC. He had asked us a couple times about the church she was attending and what did we know about it and we said it is “non denominational”. That is what she had told us and we never looked into it. Our daughter was always spiritually grounded… I have never seen spiritual warfare like this before… Suggestions on anything to read to help us thru this, of course we are praying the Spirt take hold in her heart, and she break away completely as we found out after the fact she had tried to do recently, but didn’t know about it till later and she never told us, but during the separation she was getting counsel from “good ladies” in the church.
Suggestions…
Hurting Mom
lkldfive@gmail.com
Dear Hurting Mom,
Sorry for my delayed response. I’ve been off the blog for a couple of months as my family prepares to move cross-country. I am unfamiliar with the Great Commission Church, apart from what I’ve read on the web. If your counselor is familiar with the group, I would take his advice. It does sound odd that your daughter is cutting off contact with you folks. Does she say why? All you can do is try to learn more about the specific church she is a part of–since every church is different–and try to stay in contact. If she is cutting off contact for a reason, it would be good to find out what that reasoning is and then go from there.
All the best, Steve
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Help please pray for me!, I have just had a revelation breakthrough from the Holy Spirit and do not know where to go from here. I have spent years from early childhood and after Jesus saved me in1993 struggling with the same severe issues with myself and “people in authority” which began with my parents I knew something was wrong right from being a child. I knew I was being badlyaffected and influenced by something but I could not actually quite grasp or understand or name what it was. All I knew was that I seemed to be reacting more severely to my parents”parenting” and to people who came across as judgemental,critical,bossy,controlling”bullying”,punitive and conditional with unspoken,underlying threats of possible disapproval and punishment more than my peers. I ended up feeling highly self conscious,shy,nervous,worrying,fearing the worst about myself and peoples opinions of me,always feeling wrong or in the wrong or the possibility of being wrong or doing wrong or just plain bad and had, still have struggles with low self worth,value,esteem,belief,confidence,acceptance,respect,love. So I tried to be,do and behave good,to not offend,upset or to be a trouble,trying to people please,seek approval and constantly feeling like I had to excuse,justify explain and defend myself and actions,constantly feeling condemned,guilty,accused of unseen crimes as if I was under some heavy legal sentence and also trying to be invisible so was trying to not come under people’s radars. I seemed to feel more wrotten about myself than those around me and was confusingly aware of a compulsion within me to seek out and invite punishment whether it was my own destructive,hurtful behaviour towards myself and trying to also withold joy or enjoyment or whether I sought out and invited not very nice and hurtful people to hurt me. I knew I was asking for it but could not understand why.So in relation to this article of yours that I came across after years and years of struggling with myself then crying out to the Lord for answers and enlightenment and understanding about this after He saved me,after years of misery,depression,struggle,isolation,withdrawal,rejection,breakdowns,medication,doctors and counsellors,,poor,damaging behaviours,experiences, friendships and abusive partners and struggling to stay in employment, Holy Spirit is finally getting through to me and helping me to understand and unravel all this to me and why I have ended up on the journey that I have had with the Lord,myself,life and others.and it is this. I come from an unbelieving family and I am the only one as yet that the Lord has saved. For various family history reasons I was brought up by adults that even though they had no real rules or boundaries for themselves they were very conditional,punitive,legalistic,judgemental,disapproving,bossy,controlling,demanding,critical,scathing,dismissive,hard to please,authoritive and do and do not with me. Even though they were not religiously legalistic they were worldly legalistic.So then Jesus saved me in 1993 and all was fantastic and miraculous I had found my one,real true Love God was real and alive,Jesus was my Saviour-and because I knew nothing of or about the Christian world I just assumed like a trusting child that every believer felt as free,saved,loved and joyous as I did so I was shocked when I entered into the believing family and the church that this was not so and I started to experience what I had been going through with my family but in a spiritual way and all in the name of Jesus now -religious legalism which crushed me,turned my Jesus into just another conditional,judgemental,punitive,controlling,distant,hard to please parent,nearly robbed me of my faith and intensified and aggravated my already damaged,fractured,vulnerable,unstable mental and emotional state where I had to eventually leave the church due to a breakdown.I had nothing to do with the church or believers for years as I was really mistrustful as before this I tried numerous churches where I always ended up feeling the same-judged,accused,condemned,sinful and God is not pleased with me not good enough,have to try harder but never feeling like I was getting closer to the Lord. I knew something was amiss about how I started to feel about the Lord and that surely the God I experienced and met when He first saved me cannot be the same God I am being exposed to now but because I was young in the faith and did not know about. The real true gospel of Jesus of His good news and His gospel of grace and because I was new to the Christian world I assumed I was wrong and the majority were right.However God is so good. Even though I could not read the bible,pray or stomach going to church or being with believers for years, He kept me and a tiny voice inside me kept reassuring me that all would be well.even though I did not understand or believe this. So I buried and hid His love for me and vice versa deep in my heart and tried to carry on in the world but things are never the same are they once Jesus has saved you?!The world just seemed really flat,tasteless and unappealing now however my only other option was to go back to church and I felt like I could not risk that.So fast forward many years later and add on a lot more grief,heartache,misery and pain and hell and finally I started coming across grace teaching in 2014 .Also about 2014 a believing neighbour befriended me who I felt secure with and they invited me to the church they went to. After much praying to God I decided after all these years to give it a go even though I felt that the Holy Spirit said ok but just be wary.At first it was fine and I felt accepted and included but the more I went the more I started to feel condemned and bad about myself before the Lord with the teaching and that I left church feeling starved so began the real questioning Lord why do I feel so bad,dry,uncomfortable,unfulfilled and frustrated like I did years ago and so religious,fake,phoney and hypocritical and guilty and sinful. I got and am still getting two replies,firstly I have been taught incorrectly about the real true gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, it has been mixed and diluted with the old-under law,the new-under grace and the world view and law and also my flesh and its will and ways and opinions have also played a part. However Holy Spirit has been and is exposing me more and more to the real,true message of our Lord Jesus Christ,the real gospel of His grace and helping me to understand what He actually did for me,accomplished for me,complteted,endured and finished for me at and on the cross at Calvary and it is making all the difference -all about His free gift of righteousness,love,forgiveness. Talk about being brought up by Christian legalists! Can you imagine being brought up by worldly legalists and all that that includes and affects you,then finding yourself after being saved in the hands of Christian ,religious legalists!what a horrible double whammy!but thanks be to God He is in control and He did not leave me in this horrible,hellish state! He led me to people like Joyce Meyer,Joseph Prince,Derek Prince and all the great oldies of grace after the gospels of course like Wigglesworth and the rest and TBNUK.Oh and by the way He is also helping me to forgive and let go of my earthly family along with my heavenly family ,including myself to Him as He keeps reminding me what Jesus said on the cross forgive them Father for they know not what they do.God bless