1: Bad Influences

Hey everyone,
As some of you know, Kathleen has been doing a series of Motherhood classes. As a result of the class many people have been asking questions and desiring more input. To try to help provide some ongoing support we are going to try to write some parenting e-mails. Since she's busy with being a mommy, most of those will be written by me, although she may write an occasional note to the moms. Some of the e-mails may be responses to questions that we've received, and some will be thoughts from the Word, or from our own experiences. We certainly don't have all the answers, and it is hard to give a good answer even when you really know all the details of a situation, let alone from an e-mail question, but we'll do our best to help offer some encouragement.
Like most parents, we are busy, busy, busy. However we will try to send out an e-mail once a week or so. We probably won't get to answer all the questions we receive, but we'll try to hit the more common themes.
If you do not want to be on our list, you don't need to do a thing. We will start our mailing list from scratch with our next e-mail. We don't want to intrude. If you would like to be on our list, just e-mail me back and I'll add you to the list. If you'd like someone else to be added, please forward this to them, and they can request to be added if they like.
(For those pastors on my list, I didn't add any of your people, just you. If you have people you think might be interested, feel free to forward this on. I just wanted to let you know this is available.)
Here's our first parenting e-mail (and last if you don't e-mail me back ;-)):
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Question: What do you do if your kids are associating with "bad" kids? Maybe not bad like light a cat on fire, but just a little ornery, rambunctious, or a bad influence. Can they be a good influence on the bad one?
Response: First of all, let me ask you, what's wrong with lighting cats on fire? Just kidding. I'm more of a dog person myself. Anyway, I digress (and I'm just starting). ;-) ;-)
In different small groups we've been in at times we've started with an ice breaker of, "Who was the worst influence on you as a kid?" The most common answer has always been 'neighbors'. I suppose if we were to think of the worst things we've ever done in our lives, most of them were done with someone else-a neighbor or a close friend. Having a friend there gave us a chance to prove how cool we were, or to receive approval for our acts of deviousness. In looking back at our own childhoods, I think we can see that it would be wise to not underestimate the influence of friends.
The Bible says it straight out, "Do not be misled: 'Bad company corrupts good character.'" (1 Corinthians 15:33 NIV) If your child hangs out too much with BAD INFLUENCES there is a good chance that he/she will be INFLUENCED for the BAD. Your child can be corrupted by friends, just like the metal on your car can be corrupted when exposed to water.
Your child certainly can influence others for the good, and should do so as his/her character is developed. We haven't hit the teen years yet, but I wouldn't expect younger kids to withstand a whole lot of peer pressure, because their character is not well formed. It is still being actively developed. While it's possible for the good kid to lead the bad kid, what's possible may not be as important for the moment as taking a look at what IS happening. Is your child influencing the bad influence, or is your child being negatively influenced? With some kids our kids will lead out, with others they tend to resort to becoming followers. We tell them, "If you can't lead, then follow someone who is making good choices."
If our child was being negatively influenced we would:
1) Limit the amount of time he/she is exposed to the bad influence.
2) Closely monitor the children's activities and speech when they are together.
3) Withdraw my child from the situation if it became severe enough.
For example, if our child was around a negative influence at a weekly play-date, I might shorten the play-date from 3 hours to 1 hour. I'd also try to supervise the situation more closely. If I still felt that my child was being negatively impacted, I might quit going to the play-date altogether.
What if the child is not bad, but just ornery or rambunctious? Since you're in the situation you'll need to make that assessment for your child. However, if it bothers you enough that you're asking the question, my guess is that you think it is bad enough that you want to do something about it. You obviously don't want the behavior that you've seen imitated by your child. So in light of that, I'd probably put some sort of boundaries on the relationship.
That said, I want my kids to be in the world, and influencing the world. But I don't want them in over their heads. They need to be mature enough to handle it.