Parenting Styles Compared

Alignment is the act of lining up to go straight instead of crooked. Being aware of the direction of our own parenting style, and the pattern that you received from your own parents, causes us to stop, look, and listen. Just like the alignment of tires on a car causes them to wear more evenly, your parenting in line with healthy lifestyles steers you to avoid veering too far to the right or left of the road.

Aligned and Attuned

In parenting styles, those that are loving and strict provide the best environment for their children, based on longitudinal research into behavior disorders in children. Love wins when children see that the strictness of boundaries exemplifies love.

“In the world of psychology, we tend to group parenting styles into 4 categories, which occur along a continuum. This construct was originated by Diana Baumrind in the 1960’s who did extensive work observing toddler behavior and drawing connections between parenting styles and the effects on toddlers. Here are the 4 styles:

Permissive: LOW STRUCTURE, HIGH WARMTH.
No rules or consequences, loving, affectionate, approving.

Authoritative: HIGH STRUCTURE, HIGH WARMTH.
Clear expectations and rules. Loving, empathic, firm.

Authoritarian: HIGH STRUCTURE, LOW WARMTH.
Disciplinarian, hostile, rigid.

Neglectful/Uninvolved: LOW STRUCTURE, LOW WARMTH.
Absent, unavailable, unpredictable.

We know from considerable research that authoritative parenting is associated with the best outcomes for children. These parents are warm, responsive, and empathic. They also calmly set realistic, developmentally appropriate behavioral expectations. Across culture and family forms, the authoritarian and permissive parenting styles produces poorer outcomes, affecting self-esteem, social skills, and academic performance as well as being associated with substance abuse and mental health struggles” (Decore).

God wants to lead you as a passenger through the best part of life! Notice that high limits and lovingkindness is Quadrant I. Further research indicates that the second best is Quadrant IV. Next to last is Quadrant II. The worst type of parenting is Quadrant III. This research validates the characteristics of each quadrant. Behavior disorders occur on a continuum, so knowing parenting styles helps for strategic interventions.

To avoid dysfunction and disorder, Quadrant I is the location for the best destination outcome. God has a plan. God wants to be the Driver to take you on a custom-designed tour through the best part of life! When you respond too quickly to say YES to requests from authority figures in Quadrant II— even good leaders are human — and not lean on Jesus to courteously say NO, you lose momentum, time, and vision. You get all fogged up on the path of parenting.

If you have examined your motives for going on this journey, you need God’s map to determine what gets your attention, leading in a particular direction for you to become His new creation in order to reach your destination at the Judgment Seat of Christ. Stop. Look. Listen.

Greater clarity comes with time, but you have a limited amount of time on earth. The more you know about yourself and about God, the clearer you can see out the windshield. For example, continuing to define characteristics of parenting styles in this matrix compares levels of response and demand in these examples.

Guard your heart

When your vehicle (your body, soul, mind, and spirit) is aligned with God’s compass, you are following The Great Commandment of love and have the capacity to go, know, grow, and show others the meaning of The Great Commission to go make disciples. You are being sent as a light into this dark world to reveal the love of Jesus to others. If you get “bent out of shape” by focusing on what other’s said or did that upset you, you are out of line — misaligned — ready for a wreck.

Knowing that God has a plan and purpose for you that is higher than your own gives you energy to reach your potential. Look up. You are on a path of recovery and discovery! Listen. God is speaking. Simply stop and ask, “What gives you energy? What drains you?”

If you are a parent or a child, recognize your own natural style. Then check your path. Stop. Look. Listen. You can drift off course easily. The distractions do not stop. Constant renewal of energy to be and do God’s will is essential. What does Jesus say in Luke 6: 43–49 about the constant challenge between your own ego (your will) and your soul (your actions) — the real you?

“No good tree bears bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit. Each tree is recognized by its own fruit. People do not pick figs from thornbushes, or grapes from briers. A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.

“Why do you call me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say? As for everyone who comes to me and hears my words and puts them into practice, I will show you what they are like. They are like a man building a house, who dug down deep and laid the foundation on rock. When a flood came, the torrent struck that house but could not shake it, because it was well built. But the one who hears my words and does not put them into practice is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. The moment the torrent struck that house, it collapsed and its destruction was complete.”

Do you need to stop? Pull off the road. Rest. Recheck the map. Ask God to reveal what you need to change as a parent or as a wounded child. Anger tells you something needs to change. Ask, “Is it my circumstances, my attitude, or what else?” That is what anger and frustration can do for you.

When you stop

When you stop, God starts. God begins to lift your foggy brain, the ambiguous feelings so that your spirit can and does align with His Spirit in unity of purpose and focus. God sees your heart. He knows why and examines your motives. What do you discover? You gain energy from responding to God’s timetable and priorities. Look at parenting styles to clarify God’s way.

At the Judgment Seat of Christ, you will be accountable for how you spent your time, your talents, and your treasures.

What signals and signs alert you to shift gears, let go of the wheel, and listen to the still small voice of God trying to get your attention before you wreck your life? You are the chosen vehicle God designed for your good and for His glory. You are a pearl of great price who has been purchased with His own sacrifice. As such, you are a spiritual being in a human body, much more than an object. Honor what He has given you. Respect how He made you and formed you in your mother’s womb (Psalm 139).

Listen to Limits

You have a “shelf life” and will not be here on earth forever. How long will your life will be as a parent? As a child? Look now. Notice how many times “by the Spirit” and “by His power” and “filled” and “dwell” are mentioned to solve the mystery in Ephesians 2:17–3:20.

He came and preached peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near. For through him we both have access to the Father by one Spirit.

Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit. For this reason, I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for the sake of you Gentiles —

Surely you have heard about the administration of God’s grace that was given to me for you that is, the mystery made known to me by revelation, as I have already written briefly. In reading this, then, you will be able to understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, which was not made known to people in other generations as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to God’s holy apostles and prophets. This mystery is that through the gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise in Christ Jesus.

I became a servant of this gospel by the gift of God’s grace given me through the working of his power. Although I am less than the least of all the Lord’s people, this grace was given me: to preach to the Gentiles the boundless riches of Christ, and to make plain to everyone the administration of this mystery, which for ages past was kept hidden in God, who created all things. His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms, according to his eternal purpose that he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord. In him and through faith in him we may approach God with freedom and confidence. I ask you, therefore, not to be discouraged because of my sufferings for you, which are your glory.

For this reason, I kneel before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, I may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge — that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.”

Bold lettering makes the obvious, obvious. You are a vehicle, powered by His Spirit living and residing in you. The mystery is the temple inside your physical body, the fire of the Holy Spirit at work within you, shared heritage of Jews and Gentiles.

What does that reality do for you? Take everything as from the Lord.

How does that shape your responses? There is a peace and a confidence to relax and let Him do the driving instead of getting upset by what someone else did or said, or situations that seem to be unexpected, unfair, and unsolvable.

In other words, you stop playing bumper cars, defaulting to human tactics of revenge and deception. You speak the truth in love and take every trigger captive so that a negative thought does not germinate to grow into a weed of unproductive action, leading to consequences of being burned up at the Judgment Seat of Christ.”

Now write down where you are now to where you want to go — to reach your destination. Does your bridge match God’s bridge? That means, “Begin with the end in mind.” Start small and plan for the bigger picture if you are a parent or a child or both. Your direction determines your destination and you are not alone. Your success depends on your surrender to be led by God’s Spirit, not by you trying harder. Just ask. Stop. Look. Listen.

Cadence of Accountability

1. What happens at the Judgment Seat of Christ?
2. In Ephesians 2:17–3:20 identify what caught your attention to stop, look, and listen?
3. What is the mystery mentioned throughout this passage?
4. What parenting style describes your parents? How did that affect you?
5. How will the reality of your legacy affect you and your children?