Fault-finding and hidden sin

[from the archives]

Josiah came and sat down on my bed. “Lizzy says I’m picky. Do you think I’m picky?” He was not offended, but pensive. I was chatting with a somewhat distressed mom on facebook, so he heard the “pop, pop, pop” of the facebook chat and knew that it was just as if I was on the phone, so he took his thoughts back out to the living room.

I knew his ponderings came from a lively discussion I overheard earlier from the kitchen sink as he and Lizzy cleaned the kitchen. Josiah has noted over the years that a bowl used to cook an egg in the microwave, known around here as an “egg bowl”, will not come clean in the dishwasher. That is, it’ll come out of the dishwasher with very clean egg still stuck on it. His solution is to scrub and scrape the egg off before it goes into the dishwasher. Lizzy has noted this as well, but her solution is to put it back into the dishwasher hoping for a different result the next time around. As they discussed the merits of their different approaches, Lizzy claimed that Josiah was picky.

Later, on the way to do some errands, I asked Lizzy what she thought “picky” meant. She gave a couple of nebulous stabs at defining it, so I tried a different question, “What’s the difference between ‘thorough’ and ‘picky’?”

She had a better time putting her thoughts into words. “Picky is trying to get your own way, thorough is doing a good job.”

I clarified with her, “So ‘picky’ is selfish?”  She agreed that was her thinking. She knew where I was headed, so she began to explain that Josiah was insisting the “egg-bowls” be scrubbed before they went into the dishwasher.  I asked her how he was “insisting”.

She said that he was putting the bowl back into the sink and saying, “There’s still egg on this.”

I asked what was selfish about Josiah’s words and actions. She thought about it for a while, and then decided that there wasn’t anything selfish about it. So I asked her to pick a different descriptive word for Josiah who was quietly sitting in the car beside her though this whole conversation. She decided a better word would be “careful”.

We thought the conversation was going to end there, but Lizzy suddenly decided to offer a defense for herself, “Well,” she pleaded, “It’s just that he puts the bowls in the sink, and I don’t want to scrub them!” All of us in the car responded in unison with a knowing expression of oh-I-see-now, and Lizzy began to glimpse the truth of her motivation.

As we walked into the Chiropractor’s office, I clarified for her what was going on. “So, are you saying that you didn’t want to wash the bowl, so you accused Josiah of being selfish? Is that right?” Then I took my hands and used them like a scale. I held out one hand and said, “I don’t want to wash them,” then putting up my other hand, “Josiah wants them to be clean.”  Then I moved my hands up and down as if I was considering and comparing them. Josiah decided to calmly add a factual detail that I was unaware of, “I even told Lizzy that I would scrub the bowls.”

Lizzy’s face paled with soberness and revealed the conviction of her conscience. She had been quite unloving to accuse Josiah of what she herself was doing. She immediately turned to Josiah, and said, “I’m sorry Josiah for calling you picky when I was really being the selfish one. Will you please forgive me?” Josiah smiled and said, “Yes, I forgive you Lizzy.” Then they hugged each other, and soon we were called in to our appointment.

Most of the time we just need to tell the truth about our sin, and let conviction come. We have many ways of turning our sin around so that we can think of ourselves in a good light, and then we can’t think of anything to repent of. Fault-finding critical thoughts are nearly always rooted in our own hidden sin; hidden from ourselves.

To learn more about heart-level parenting, read Marilyn Howshall’s ebook Empowering the Transfer of Moral Values and Faith.

[originally posted, Aug 2010]