TLP 309: The Hidden Sin in Our Homes, Part 1 | the fruit

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They say the people who complain this way don't necessarily want something to be fixed, they just want to be heard.

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They suggest that someone may say, I have to work late a second Friday night in a row, so they can hear someone else say, that's a bummer.

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Welcome to Truth. Love. Parents. Where we use God's Word to become intentional, premeditated parents.

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Here's your host, AM Brewster. How do you find something that's hidden? Today we're going to rip the camouflage off a significant problem in each of our homes.

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I pray that God's Word will spread its revealing and yet comforting light into each of our hearts to help us become the parents

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God wants us to be, so we can help our children become the men and women He called and created them to be. But before we do that, don't forget to do your

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PayPal and the investment doesn't have to be as much as some people think it does. Cool. Now let's start our discussion about the hidden sin in our homes and be sure to check out our free episode notes and transcripts at truthloveparent .com.

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Now when I mentioned the topic of today's show, most of you will likely think I did some fancy click bait and switch, right?

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That's not what I'm going to do. I realize that most of you will already know today's topic is a sin, at least most of the time.

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And many of you may even be doing something about it. But what we want to do over the next three episodes is dissect each individual fruit, discover the root from which they grow, and then learn the truth necessary to treat the problem.

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Here we go. The hidden sin in our homes is complaining.

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Call it complaining, griping, whining, murmuring, grumbling, or call it whatever you want. It's a sin. Now, again,

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I recognize that most of you will immediately agree with me, with everything I just said, and you probably are wondering, how could

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I suggest that this is a hidden sin? It seems pretty obvious when our kids whine. Well, I believe most of it is hidden for three reasons.

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Number one, there are many parents who don't see anything wrong with complaining, as long as the child isn't complaining about something the parent has done.

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Number two, it's easy for us to see some complaining for what it is while being completely blind to others.

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For example, though it may be easy to see whining in others, we're too often blind to our own.

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Or, our ear can pick up certain kinds of whining, but even when it's coming from the same person, we miss other kinds of whining.

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Number three, it's easier to address the fruit of complaining without dealing with the much more significant root of complaining.

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So, with that said, let's dissect what it means to complain. Merriam -Webster defines it as, quote, to express grief, pain, or discontent, or to make a formal accusation or charge.

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And I think the meaning in the Scriptures is consistent with those definitions. Some complaints are clearly sinful, while other uses of the word complaint are acceptable.

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Well, we're not going to deal with the positive definition in this series. These episodes aren't going to be about legitimate, formal accusations.

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We're going to discuss the sinful stuff. So, let's walk through some of the biblical content concerning complaining.

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Though it's not necessarily called grumbling, we're introduced to the very first complaint in Genesis 3 .12.

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The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit of the tree and I ate. We like to focus on the blame -shifting element of Adam's failed family talk, but we also need to see that his blame -shifting involved complaining about his wife and what she did.

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Moving on, when it comes to examples of grumbling in the Bible, I think people who are familiar with the

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Scriptures immediately think of the children of Israel. A good example is Numbers 11 .1. His anger was kindled, and the fire of the

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Lord burned among them and consumed some outlying parts of the camp. As you can tell, God was not okay with their complaining.

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First Corinthians 10, 9 -11 reference these same people when it says, Now, these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, on whom the end of the ages has come.

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God wanted Moses to include the excessive whining of the Jews, in part, so that we could learn how wicked it really is.

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Another good New Testament handling of this topic is in Philippians 2 .12 -16. Do all things without grumbling or questioning, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish, in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain."

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We'll talk more about this passage later in this series, but moving on, Jude 1 .16 addresses false teachers when he says they are,

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So, God is clear that grumbling, murmuring, whining, fussing, moaning, bellyaching, griping, muttering, and complaining are clearly a sin.

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Now, we're not going to really talk about the why today. Why is complaining a sin? We're going to discuss that next time.

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For now, we need to at least accept that. Most of the time, it is wrong. But I want to spend the rest of our time today identifying it.

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Not being able to see it for what it is causes it to remain unaddressed and hidden in our homes.

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According to Thrive Global, there are four different types of complaints. They claim that frivolous or recreational complaints are used to validate a person's worldview or make fun of something.

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They use the example of someone sitting alone at their desk saying out loud, I have to work late Friday night.

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They also say that there are empathy -seeking complaints. They say the people who complain this way don't necessarily want something to be fixed.

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They just want to be heard. They suggest that someone may say, I have to work late a second Friday night in a row so they can hear someone else say, that's a bummer.

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Then there's the interesting category of withholding complaints. Thrive Global explains that this is the most toxic way to complain.

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They argue that when people say nothing at all and begin to harbor resentment and internalize anger, they might start to exhibit passive -aggressive behavior, or even just plain aggressive behavior.

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For example, I have to work late a third Friday night in a row, no problem at all, happy to be here, when in fact the tone of voice and emails reveal something very different.

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And lastly, they enumerate action complaints. These people are not like the empathy seekers. They want action.

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They want change. They don't just want validation. The example they provide is, I have to work late a fourth

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Friday night in a row. What can we do different so we are not here next week? Psychology Today posits that there are three types of complaints.

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They mention chronic complaining from people who never seem satisfied. They mention venting, which is designed to express emotional dissatisfaction.

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Psych Today explains, quote, it turns out that people who vent have an agenda. They tend to be focused on themselves and their own presumably negative experience.

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By showing their anger, frustration, or disappointment, they are soliciting attention from their confidants.

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They can feel validated by receiving attention and sympathy. Venters are particularly likely to discount advice and propose solutions to their problems.

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They aren't looking to solve anything. They simply want validation, unquote. Then they claim the last category of complaining is the best.

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They call it instrumental complaining and describe it as acknowledging the importance of change and possessing the desire to solve problems.

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Now, based off these definitions alone, I think we would likely view our kids whining as venting or empathy -seeking or recreational complaints.

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It's a form of entertainment in our homes. What's funny is that neither Thrive Global nor Psychology Today actually categorize our family's sinful complaining the way

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God does. And let's be honest, that shouldn't surprise us. Do I believe that some people are just seeking validation or empathy?

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Yeah, sure. But I also believe that most of the time members of our family complain, they definitely want to see some change.

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But just because they want to see some change doesn't make their complaining inherently good.

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I don't want to do homework is more often than not a sly manipulation tool to guilt the authority into not requiring homework.

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But it's raining is viewed as a legitimate excuse for you to change your expectation that I have to put away the toys

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I left in the yard. I don't like broccoli is more than simply venting. It's a backdoor, slanderous, often subconscious way to change the status quo.

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According to both of the previous sources, complaints that seek change are not bad. They're beneficial. And this is why

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I believe so much sinful complaining goes unnoticed in our homes. We obviously believe our grumbling has merit, and so therefore it is excused or even encouraged because we're not looking at it the way

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God does. We're looking at it the way the world does. Consider the Israelites. They were hungry.

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They were thirsty. They had to wait 40 days for Moses to return from the mountain. There were giants in the land.

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Whatever the complaint, they wanted something to change. They wanted food and water and for Moses to get back and to not have to run giants out of the promised land.

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But their complaining was still a sin. Now, I'm not saying that all complaining that seeks change is a sin.

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We open the show with the reality that some complaints are simply a formal accusation or charge and those will always be seeking change as well.

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Now, we're going to discuss next time why one kind of complaining that seeks change is bad and why another isn't.

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But here's your assignment until that time. Number one, anytime someone in your house, including you, makes a statement that expresses any kind of dislike, disagreement, or discontentment, take a moment to consider the possibility that the statement they just made was sinful complaining.

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I'm not saying that all such statements are a sin and therefore need to be consequenced, but we need to be more diligent to uncover the sinful ones.

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And that starts with being observant. Last night my daughter was relating an anecdote from the children's program at our church and I had to stop her and say,

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Ivy, please stop using the word like. She's only 10, but I swear she talks like a little teenager. Anyway, it took me saying that a couple times, but then later in her account, a few sentences later before the word even escaped her lips, she recognized that she was about to say it again.

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And instead she said, wow, I really made a habit out of that. Sometimes just paying attention to the problem is all it takes to get us thinking correctly about it.

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And number two, take some time to think about what makes a complaint sinful. You have to be intentional about this.

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You announce to your homeschool children that it's time to take out math and they respond with an immediate but low key, is that okay?

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Does that glorify God? If it doesn't, why is it wrong? You need to be able to answer these questions before you can have a valuable conversation with your kids.

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So take some time to consider your children's words and your own. Really think about whether they please the

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Lord and then take the extra step to consider what makes the whining and complaining and griping sinful.

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Lord willing, next time we'll look at the root of complaining to understand exactly why God hates it so much and we'll set our trajectory for parenting it biblically.

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Most of the time, complaining is a sin and God wants us to parent our children to the right heart attitude that complaining is no longer a temptation.

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So if that's something you'd like to see in your house, let's get together and talk about this next time. Truth. Love.

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Join us next time as we search God's word for the truth your family needs today.