This is not meant to offend.
I've had directed blog posts before, but not one written with just one person/group of persons in mind. This changes that.
It's meant to remind me of where i should be. Rather, where i shouldn't be.
It's meant to remind me of the standards i must hold myself to.
It's meant to remind me of growth.
"I didn't know he cussed," one said with a frown.
The other looked offended, "He doesn't."
"You've never been around him when you're not there. Might surprise you."
"Listen, he's had a hard life, okay? You can't blame him for one slip!" the other exclaimed.
The first sighed, and responded softly, "It wasn't a slip; he didn't even know he did it when I asked him about it. It's what he does, just not around y'all. And he's not of the world, I'm not supposed to hold him to the world's standards. Am I?"
"He doesn't cuss, got it?"
"Neither do you . . ."
"That's not fair."
Some might know the situation surrounding this. Maybe. I don't know.
I should clarify that i don't necessarily think cussing is an absolute sin. I think it's subjective, to be honest. If you feel convicted, then don't do it. But it's a gray area, and i like to stay away from such things.
If you're a Christian and you cuss, i won't judge you. If you serve in the church or claim to be a representative of Christ, i will hold you to unworldly standards. 1 Corinthians 8 and Romans 12:1-2 more or less explain my reasoning.
"Train up a child in the way he should go,
And when he is old he will not depart from it."
Proverbs 22:6
That's not just telling a child how they should act, but showing them by example.
If you do something, you can rest assured your children will do the same.
Yes, they see you at the altar, they see you with your hands raised, they see you when you're happy and worshiping, they see you when you're Godly.
They also see you the other six days of the week. Even if something you do is not done around your family, your children will still imitate you.
If you say "We don't say that in this house," yet you say it outside of it, so they will as well. If you claim to not cuss, yet you do when you're not around your family, your children will also cuss when they're not around you. Children are a fruit of your works.
A friend of mine who's from a family that "doesn't cuss" did cuss. And not rarely. I once confronted them about it, saying "Your parents don't want you cussing, do they?"
The response was shocking; "I don't cuss in their house."
I wondered if that was a fruit of the works of the parents, but kept the thought fleeting.
It had to be the world and my friend's exposure to it. After all, that's what they told me was the cause.
But i've since realized that "As for me and my house we will serve the Lord" is the motto. The house is pure. The house is clean. The house is safe. The house is a building.
Outside, much is still refrained. But i heard many stories that i did not ask to hear from several firsthand witnesses. Stories that disgusted me. Stories they laughed at.
It's not the cussing in general that bothers me. It doesn't bother me that i was told i'm "sitting on [my] ***."
No, the thing that bothered me is that these people would've shunned me if i had said that same thing. Err, rather, they probably would've shunned me if i'd said it in their house.It bothered me that the ones telling me the stories -and laughing at them- were under their authority, and weren't supposed to cuss, or even say "sucks" in the context of lacking quality. I don't say it in that context.
Then the authority figure told me that. And also said "It hurts, and it s**ks."
I stared at the letter he sent in complete bewilderment.
Those words in themselves don't matter. But when you set a rule and don't follow it, when you rebuke the a word that you use yourself, that is "The practice of claiming to have moral standards or beliefs to which one's own behavior does not conform."
That's a sin. It's called hypocrisy.
I have to remind myself that, if i ever have children, i must hold myself to the same standards i set for them.
Actually, i'm wrong. I must hold myself to stricter standards. The example i set will be followed. If that's being holy in church and in the house, yet becoming part of the world when i go out into it, then i know my children would do the same. If i were to "like" things online that are foul, crude, vulgar, and sexually immoral, it would be expected that my children would be alright with the same things.
I am a hypocrite. I'm quicker to point out my own falls and shortcomings than i am to point out anyone else's.
I am a hypocrite. My anger has a hold on me.
Maybe i can learn to get a hold on it and direct it gracefully, using it as a motivation to make positive change. And i'm using it this time to remind myself to grow and to hold myself to unworldly standards, to remember that i am in and not of, that i am not "one of the guys" not only because of my social awkwardness, but because i simply do not fit or conform.
