Children are often the beginning of conflict between adults. Sometimes it isn’t their fault, but at the same time, it sometimes is. There are multiple ways this can happen, but let me focus on just one. The attitude that drives this one is found in most if not all of the others, and so it is often sufficient to deal with it truly in one instance.
Children often misrepresent things to their parents. Sometimes it is inadvertent, because of a limited vantage point, but at other times it is quite deliberate. All of us have a tendency to tell stories in a way that leaves us looking better in the moment than perhaps we were. When this happens around the dinner table, parents sometimes conclude that, sadly, their good friends over there have a child who is a pill. But in actual fact, the pill in question may be seated right across from them, telling lurid stories.
One of the great peacemaker passages of the Bible is found in Prov. 18:17—a verse that says until you have both sides, you don’t really have the story. When our children are involved, this wisdom should be underscored, not neglected. This is because it is often the case that children who complain about cattiness are often catty themselves, those who complain about “in-groups” are often masterful clique-makers, those who are mortally offended are the chief offenders, those who don’t like being bossed chiefly don’t like it because they don’t get to boss, and those who complain about pills do so because they don’t like the competition. And this continues to happen because their parents listen more to their children than to the Scriptures.