“And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell.”
Matthew 5:30
Sometimes things need to be cut out—or off, if you take Jesus at his word. This verse sends my mind straight into a scene from the first Saw movie. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, good for you—you are probably a better person than I am. Jesus paints a gruesome picture with these words.
So what does Christ mean?
Some people have taught that Jesus used purposeful exaggeration to grab the audience’s attention. I’m not saying that that’s not true, but I think he’s being deadly serious in this passage. He doesn’t wink or give his disciples an elbow jab. And yet… I don’t recall any accounts of the Apostles amputating their limbs or cutting out their eyes. I think that’s because our hands, feet and eyes aren’t the cause of our sin and never have been. But for the stuff that does lead us to sin…
CUT IT OUT!
CUT IT OUT: Cultural Amputation
When my daughter was around four years old—before we knew about her AHDH or autism—she watched a cartoon I heard several parents complain about. The little boy featured in the show acted like a typical four-year-old child, disobedience and grumblings included. I agreed that the character was could be a bit annoying, but at the time, I had been so sick of seeing television shows where kids seemed way too grown up. These sitcoms almost always included bumbling or absent parents, and I liked to see this fictional character’s parents actually involved. And so I allowed Kayla to continue watching the show.
That is… until the day I heard the exact same obnoxious whiny phrases coming from my daughter’s mouth.
No, ma’am!
All of a sudden, this cartoon wasn’t so cute anymore. After trying again and again to stop the show from influencing Kayla’s behavior, I finally had to cut it out of her life. I preformed a cultural amputation, and eventually, she stopped sounding as whiny. I mean, she was four, so the show was only partially to blame. She’s a preteen now and still whines sometimes.
Another cultural amputation involved a video game. It had zero parental settings and even though we guided and limited her use, she still came across some evil material that she could not see as evil. In fact, to this day, I believe she’s obsessed with this grotesque character. She cannot wrap her mind around the reason it’s so dangerous. She even shared this thing with her younger friends, who ended up having nightmares. Her lack of self-control led to us deleting the game permanently.
CUT IT OUT: Locational Amputation
There are just certain atmospheres Kayla doesn’t do well in. To take her, my husband and I have to arm ourselves in patience and endurance. Prep for the battle, so to speak. One of these places is the store. ANY store. She needs many reminders about what the specific purpose of our trip is and what it’s not. Otherwise, we stay ten times longer than expected and we’re saying, “no” over and over again—which is exhausting—because she’s asking for everything in sight. Now that she’s old enough to stay home, we rarely take her with us. It’s too tempting for her and too tempting for us to get frustrated and lose our cool.
For us adults, if we are alcoholics, the stupidest place to enter is a bar. If you find that a specific place causes repeated problems, and you can, stop going to that location. Another example for Kayla is our second barn. She is allowed to roam to the first one, but beyond that is the chicken coop and the other barn that’s stocked with all sorts of things she could misuse or hurt herself with.
There are countless other things to cut out if needed.
I have to pay extra attention to what influences Kayla because kids with ADHD tend to be bigger risk takers because they just don’t think about future consequences as well. Also, they tend to spend more time on technology as do people on the spectrum. More time equals a greater influence. As her mom, it’s my job to protect her as much as I can. Even from herself. I understand that I can’t do this entirely or forever; I need to trust God. However, my responsibility as her parent is to train her up in the way she should go (Proverbs 22:6).
We should be our children’s greatest influencers. So sharpen your scissors, and cut out what needs cutting.
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