Thursday, April 2, 2009

Younger Siblings are pretty annoying, aren't they?

So you're sitting there reading a book, and your little brother comes up to you and asks you to get him a cup of water. It's not a long distance to the kitchen, but you tell him to go ask another sibling. Another instance: Your friend tells you a joke and you laugh. Later your little brother tells a joke, and you ignore him.
I'm not saying that You or I have done that, but chances are something like that has happened to you. But why? Why is it so much easier to converse with our peers but not our siblings? 1 John 4:20 says: If a man says, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?
So here there is shown an important link between our God and our family. So the issue of family relations is important, but still, what do we do?
We look at the three words: Love, Pride, and Duty.

#1. Love. Love is not just a feeling, and it most often feels bad because love is sacrificial. To have a close relationship with anybody, even our little brothers and sisters, you have to have the mindset that says: "I don't care if I am not the center of attention. I want to serve my family and those around me, even when that is hard for me to do."

#2. Pride. Pride is a human plague. It can be so harmful to your circles of friend and family. Usually when talking to younger people, pride is what restrains you from truly encouraging them, because your older than them right? Your supposed to be better than them, and some people will go to drastic measures to beat down people or talk down them when they feel that their younger siblings are doing better than them, or if they are smarter than them. Seeing younger or less experienced people do better than you or get more praise than you is a blow to the human nature but Proverbs 11:2 says: “When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with the humble is wisdom.”

#3. Duty. In Genesis 4:9 Cain doubted whether it was his responsibility to take care of his little brother or not. And this is a pretty common problem. As older siblings we don't realize just how much influence we have on the younger people. If you watch closely however, you will usually see some behavior in your little follower that looks just like yours. In a way, your relational abilities with your brothers and sisters show how you will act with your spouse and children, so if you don't teach your younger brothers now, how will you know how to teach your children? and because these little ones learn from your example, the pressure is on you as the older one to do what is right.

1 comment:

  1. Good thoughts, and I think that your words are very true. I don't always act the way I should towards younger siblings, and I think you've given some good stuff to think about...

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