Carlton McLeod explains in this video that when he thinks about some of the parenting mistakes that he has made, it is important not to compare your family to another family. That can cause impatience with a spouse or one's children. It is important to remember that Scripture alone is to be our guide -- not what our friends or others do or say.

Matthew 7:24 (NKJV) - "Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock."

When I think about some of the parenting mistakes that I've made personally and some of the people that I have the privilege to pastor have made that you don't think about, honestly I think comparison drives a lot of it and just comparing our family to what looks to be this pristine family in some other household And that drives a lot of impatience, I think, sometimes with our children. So if I had to categorize it, I would say comparison and just being patient. Sometimes in our tribe, if you will, much is made of how we raise our children and rightfully so. And we all want our children to dress modest and love the Lord and lift their hearts to God and worship and all those things. But sometimes we do encounter situations where our children aren't, in our opinion, coming along as fast, as quickly as maybe we want them to.

And then we look at another family and it seems to be so well put together and we're going, wow, what a mom and what a dad. And we're, you know, somewhere down in us, we're maybe a little jealous and a little impatient and we begin to press down on our children a little harder than maybe we need to. And I've seen that a time or two, that impatience and driven by comparison. And that has a tendency to do great, great harm in families. The truth is all of our children are different.

They're all beautiful, eternal souls made in the image of God, but they're different and they come along different. The Holy Spirit deals with each of them differently. And so an overarching mistake I think that we parents make sometimes is just assuming that they're gonna get it when we give it to them. And they're gonna know the teaching because we've given it to them. And now we insist upon that first time obedience, and we should, but just understand that it's gonna require patience with our children.

I think that can relieve a lot of the parental stress. I think sometimes if we just, okay, we'll keep teaching, we'll keep grinding, we'll keep trusting the Lord. And most of the frustrations that I've seen, parents who are diligently trying to raise their children, they've just become impatient with them. So.