“Good Job!”

Raise up a child in the way he should go, And when he is old he will not depart from it. Proverbs 22:6 (NKJV)

 

In earlier times children were taught to work hard.

I remember having to redo my assigned housework if my mother saw one speck of dirt left behind when I was finished. It did not matter to her what I had waiting (usually friends to play with outside). If it wasn’t right, we had to do it over.

Many classroom teachers talk about the “entitled” children that are coming to school today. Every child, and many parents, think that they should be rewarded for effort, not for progress or mastering a skill. Some children are openly rebellious to teachers and no authority seems to scare them.

There are also many employers complaining that they cannot find good help today. We hear from them that Generation X does not want to work hard. They want to be rewarded for doing the basics rather than their best. They want raises and promotions but not work.

This is a wake-up call for Christians. As adults, do we want to be rewarded by our employers when we know we are doing the bare minimum to get the paycheck? Are we annoyed when someone is promoted before us when we have put in more time but not more work than they have?

What are we teaching the next generation? Parents and grandparents, Sunday School teachers or nursery workers, home school Moms or those teaching in co-ops, do we hear what has happened to the children that have now been raised in the “Good job!” generation? They have heard it whether they actually did one or not.

Sometimes it may seem easier to accept whatever a child does as “done” rather than correcting their mistakes. Many parents are guilty of fixing his/her less-than-perfect work because it was easier than waiting for them to get it right. (Do we see the example we are setting there?)

Years ago it was a big deal to be congratulated on a “good job.” Now, kids want that for a job that is barely “done.” It seems that there was so much sympathy for the child who never got a reward that we started rewarding anything we could.

We used to be taught that “everyone is good at something. We all have different gifts and will not be good at everything.”

Today’s children hear, “You can be anything you want to be! Dream big and listen to your heart.”

This ignores the uniqueness of every individual. God says He has given different gifts. It also ignores the truth of scripture that “the heart is deceitful and desperately wicked, who can know it?”

Children today will fare much better in God’s created world if they are taught to take His Word to heart. They will be better served by developing His unique gifts rather than their own desires.

Hearing the words, “Great Job!” for something they know they did not do well leaves a child unsure of what his/her gifts truly are. Honesty regarding their talents and skills is good for them.

Christian parents and teachers, are we training a whole generation to be so full of self-esteem that they fail to see the need to esteem Almighty God?