Let faith drive your parenting, not fear

When my son was around 8 months old he got quite badly burnt. He grabbed a cup of recently boiled water and tipped it all over himself. It was every parents nightmare, and what made it even worse was that it was my fault.

I was preparing his lunch by heating a pouch of baby food in a cup of hot water and in my new-dad, sleep-deprived state, I placed the cup down on the tray of his high chair and turned away for a second to help my wife with something.

Moments later, the realisation of what I’d done hit me. I turned back instantly and saw, to my horror, that he was reaching for the cup. 

Suddenly, it felt like everything moved in slow motion. I saw him pick up the cup, I yelled “Nooooooo!” and rushed over to take it away from him.

But it was too late.

In a world where I’m supposed to be one of my children’s key protectors, what if I end up being the person who ends up hurting them the most?

Before I could get to him, he tipped the scalding hot water all over himself, badly burning his torso and legs. Everything went silent for a moment. And then he screamed a scream I’ll never forget. 

As quickly as I could, I grabbed him out of his highchair, stripped him out of his baby grow and put him under an ice cold shower while my wife called the ambulance. 

They responded very quickly and rushed us to hospital where I held him under a cold tap again, for 30 another minutes, while he bawled his eyes out. Then the doctors dressed his wounds and gave him pain killers and he fell asleep on me. 

That night, when I returned home from hospital, it was my turn to cry. I remember all my emotions pouring out as I apologised to my wife through snotty tears. “It was all my fault! I hurt my little boy!” She comforted me, but the dad-guilt was so real.

The truth is, parenthood seems to create an endless supply of “what ifs.” Because fear loves asking “what if?”

Thankfully (praise God) he was ok and made a very quick recovery. If you saw him today, you wouldn’t know he’d ever sustained such an injury. No scars or lasting damage at all.

Not for him anyway. I still have the scars to this day. I still remember the moment vividly. The pain on his tiny face is still carved into my heart. Even though he was ok, I don’t think it’ll ever leave me. 

I don’t mean the guilt - I’ve overcome that - I know it was an silly, absent-minded accident. We all make mistakes and these things happen.

We start parenting from a place of anxiety rather than a place of peace and become paralysed by the possibility of making mistakes

No, I mean the fear. The fear I’ll make similarly severe mistakes in the future. And what if, this time, things aren’t ok? In a world where I’m supposed to be one of my children’s key protectors, what if I end up being the person who ends up hurting them the most? 

What if I’m too strict and push them away?

What if I’m too lenient and fail to prepare them for the real world?

What if I miss something important with their health? Or their mental health? 

What if I spend so much time trying to provide for them that I forget to be present with them?

What if I say the wrong thing at the wrong moment?

What if I don’t say the right thing when they need it most?

What if I pass on more of my weaknesses than my strengths?

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I wonder if you can relate to any of those feelings? Hopefully it’s not a constant fear for you, but those intrusive parental thoughts can plague us from time to time, can’t they? The truth is, parenthood seems to create an endless supply of “what ifs.” Because fear loves asking “what if?”

What if you fail?

What if you get it wrong?

What if you’re not enough?

And if we’re not careful, those questions can begin to define us. We start parenting from a place of anxiety rather than a place of peace and become paralysed by the possibility of making mistakes. But recently I’ve realised something. Fear asks, “What if?” But faith says, ”Even if.”

Even if I make mistakes, God’s grace is bigger than my failures.

Even if I don’t always know what I’m doing, God does. 

Even if I get things wrong sometimes, God is able to work through imperfect parents.

Even if I can’t protect my children from every hurt, I can trust them to the One who loves them even more than I do.

That’s why I keep coming back to Paul’s words in 2 Timothy: “For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of self-control.”

ultimately, my children were never safest in my hands in the first place. They’ve always been safest in God’s

Not fear.

Power. Love. Self-control.

As a parent, that doesn’t mean I suddenly become fearless. It doesn’t mean I stop worrying about my children or never make mistakes again. In fact, not all fear is negative - sometimes it’s the trigger for wisdom. It just means I don’t live in that place permanently and fear doesn’t get the final say.

With God’s help, I can parent with power - not the power to control every outcome, but the courage to do what’s right even when I’m uncertain and leave the outcomes to God. I can parent with love - not a fearful, over-protective love that tries to hold on too tightly, but a patient, sacrificial love that points my children towards Jesus. And I can parent with self-control - not reacting from panic, guilt or anxiety, but responding with wisdom, grace and consistency.

The reality is that my children will remember some of the mistakes I’ve made. Every parent leaves some fingerprints on their children’s story. For good and for bad. But what I hope they’ll remember most is not a dad who got everything right. I hope they’ll remember a dad who trusted God even when he got it wrong. 

A dad who was quick to apologise. 

A dad who loved them deeply.

A dad who kept showing up.

And a dad who knew that while he couldn’t protect them from everything, he could entrust them to the one who can. Because ultimately, my children were never safest in my hands in the first place. They’ve always been safest in God’s.