TLP 291: Parenting Angry Children, Part 5 | how to help our kids with their slander

Does your child lie about people she’s mad at? Is she always cutting down her enemies? Join AMBrewster as he looks at the biblical definition of slander and helps Christian parents lead their angry children to Truth.

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Listen to the following episodes on Apple Podcasts by clicking the titles.
“Tackling Tattling” (episode 93)
“The Communication House” (episode 38)

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Episode Notes

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Transcript

Introduction

Last time we looked at how to help our kids with their malice, and today we’re going to discuss how to help our kids with their slander.

Before we do that, though, I do want to thank Scott, Mindee, and Jess for making today’s episode possible. Our Patrons are exceedingly valuable as they give so that Christian parents all over the world have access to this free parenting resource.

My wife and I love Galatians 6:8-10 which reads, “The one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life. 9 Let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we will reap if we do not grow weary. 10 So then, while we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, and especially to those who are of the household of the faith.”

Mindee, Jess, and Scott have done good to the household of faith, in part, by giving to TLP.

If you’d like to learn more about this opportunity for doing good, just click on the “5 Ways to Support TLP" link in the description of this episode.

And I also want to thank Danielle who took a recent opportunity to do good to TLP. She shared this on Facebook, “Truth.Love.Parent is biblically based, full of practical application for parents! I can’t even tell you how encouraging it has been to listen to while I’m working, cleaning, cooking. I’m glad that I stumbled upon it one day! I thank God for your faithfulness to Scripture and your ministry to families!”

You guys are all so great!

Perfect. Now, let’s talk about how to help our slanderous child.

Topic

Defintion

As always, let’s start by making sure we’re on the same page.

Merriam-Webster defines “slander” as “the utterance of false charges or misrepresentations which defame and damage another’s reputation.”

Two episodes ago we saw that the Greek word translated “slander” is translated “blaspheme” when aimed at God.

A slanderous child is one who desires to tear down the perceived source of their discomfort by gossiping and lying and manipulating. 

Be very careful as you consider whether or not your child is slanderous. Some slander will be obvious, others more culturally acceptable and, therefore, harder to spot. In episode 93 we discussed “Tackling Tattling” with Jessica Mair. During that interview we discussed the fact that tattlers aren’t always interested in the whole truth and nothing but the truth. 

When a child runs into the room screaming that his sibling took something from him, but he conveniently leaves out the fact that he took it from the other child first . . . he’s slandering.

Claims that “My teacher hates me,” are slanderous . . . unless — of course — the teacher actually hates them. And how often is that ever true?

Children who lie about someone because they’re angry at them are slanderous.

Now, there are many ways slander works itself out, bu you’re going to have to figure out your child. 

Nature

In regard to its nature, slander has many marks against it. 

1. It’s foolish because it denies God’s reality. Proverbs 10:18 says, “Whoever utters slander is a fool.”
2. It’s a product of sinful anger.
3. It’s a lie — whether intentional or not. Even if the child believes it to be true, slander is an untruth.

You may be wondering what you call it if a child is obviously angry, but they’re telling the truth about the other person. Well, that’s likely wrath or clamor, and we’ll talk about those later.

For now, we’re discussing intentional and unintentional lies designed to malign another’s character.

So, how do we help a child who struggles with slander?

I don’t plan to repeat it every time, but now’s a good place to remind us that the best time to teach and reprove our angry children is before they get angry.

Too often we wait to confront our kids about their anger until they’re in the throws of yet another meltdown. This is not helpful. 

Now, of course, you do have to parent your child off the ledge. And yes, you’re going to use the Bible to do so, but it’s so much wiser to deal with the heart before the emotions get involved.

I plan to discuss the emotional elements of anger when we talk about a wrathful child.

For now, though, last episode’s first point still stands. But today’s first point is . . .

1. Slanderous children need to have their delusion confronted.

In episode 38 we talked about “The Communication House.” On that show we learned that no real communication can take place if we step outside God’s expectations for communication.

And since Truth is the foundation of The Communication House, then we can know for sure our children are not glorifying God in their talk if they’re lying — whether intentionally or not.

This means that before any beneficial discussion can take place, your child is either going to have to reenter the House or they’re going to have to at least agree to listen and not talk. Of course, that’s not the most optimal option.

Again, I can only get so specific with my examples. Each situation and relationship is unique, so you’ll likely approach each one a little differently. 

But I can say this is a tact I have to take all the time at Victory Academy. I personally refuse to move forward in a conversation until we’ve established truth.

This can go in a couple different directions.

A. I never allow the child to continue in a delusion about God. 

If the kid says something like “God doesn’t care about me,” then it makes absolutely no sense to continue admonishing Him to obey God.

B. Unless I was there and witnessed what happened, I investigate the claim versus accepting the child’s presentation of the facts.

If the child leads off with a litany of accusations, I do my best to discover the Truth before blindly functioning from the standpoint that he’s right. He could be actively engaged in slander. 

C. I clarify every time I’m misquoted.

When the student claims I said or did something I didn’t say or do, we can’t move forward. Now, it’s easy to be tempted to pridefully defend yourself. This is not what I’m suggesting. We’re talking about laying a groundwork of Truth. 

If a child is mad at me because he said I called him “stupid,” but what I actually said was “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” then there’s no moving forward unless we can come to a right understanding of reality.

I mentioned last time that if your child is malicious toward you, you really need to get a third party involved. I can say the same thing about slanderous children. 

Your youth pastor may inform you that your child told him you hit her. Now, assuming that’s not true, you can confront your child; they know the truth. However, if the youth pastor or another authority is there for the confrontation, your child may continue the lie to avoid being thought guilty of lying in their eyes.

In situations where your youth pastor informs you your son was complaining that you said he had to quit his job, but what really happened was that you said he needed to work fewer hours, and then he said if he won’t commit to at least 30 hours his employer would let him go, and then you said that may have to be what happened, you can confront your son, but his interpretation of the fact is being informed by his darkened heart. His interpretation is all off, and unless he submits to your interpretation, you’re in a tough spot.

But, the truth must come out. It would still be appropriate to say something like, “I’m sorry you thought I told you that you had to quit your job. I understand how you came to that conclusion. But I think the difference is that I’m trusting God a little more than you are. You absolutely believe you need this job, and if you obey me, you’re absolutely certain you’re going to lose something that you need. But from my end, I know that God always provides what we need as long as we love Him and are working toward His honor and glory. I told you that you needed to work fewer hours, specifically because I didn’t want you working on Sundays or Wednesday evenings so you could attend church.”

At this point, further discussion may be able to take place as long as he’s willing to accept the biblically logical interpretation. 

Remember, slanderous children don’t function from a foundation of Truth. If it’s unintentional, they need to receive clarification so they can — hopefully — reevaluate what they thought.

But if it’s intentional . . .

2. Slanderous Children need to experience the consequences of their slander.

As I mentioned before, slander is not only a result of anger, it’s — more often than not — a lie.

If the child’s lie can be revealed, there should be appropriate consequences.

If the young man from the previous example deliberately lied to the youth pastor, that would be different than his coming to the wrong understanding because he was emotional at the time.

Now, instead of discussing how to give consequences and what kinds of consequences to give — because all of that is subjective depending on the situation — I want to talk about the psychology of lying.

One of the things we work hard to do at Victory Academy is provide constant supervision so that lying becomes an almost impossibility. Not only is the authority always there, but there’s always at least two other witnesses who can chime in if necessary.

However, even in this environment, opportunities will arise for kids to lie about another child or even a staff member. It’s in these situations where the staff has to be hyper-vigilant to investigate what happened.

Let me start by first stating that in the absence of verifiable evidence, we are okay letting a lie off the hook. What do I mean?

Let’s say a student managed to get away from the pack, sneak into an office, and steal a phone from a desk. A staff member notices that the child is missing, back tracks, and finds them walking out of the office. The child is confronted about what he was doing, he says he wanted to see if the letter from his parents arrived, and so he just poked his head into the office. 

That boy may receive some sort of consequence for leaving the group or poking his head in places it didn’t belong. 

And — before I continue — I have to also admit that any number of balls had to be dropped by the staff for any of this to play out. The supervision wasn’t careful enough to realize the boy walked away or to determine how long he had been gone, the office door was left unlocked by the last person to leave it, etc.

So, later that evening a staff member enters the office and notices his phone is missing from the desk. Of course, by this time the thief has been able to stash his acquisition and no longer has it on him.

An email is sent out about the missing phone, the supervising staff member remembers the office incident and lets me know, I confront the child and question him about his time in the office.

Let’s just say that after all of my inquiries and tactics to discover if he’s lying, the kid is still claiming that he didn’t take the phone. Many times in situations like this, with me 100% certain the child did something, yet with nothing but his word against a hunch on my part, I won’t hold him accountable for stealing the phone. I’ll let him know that God is perfectly aware of what happened and to be sure his sin will find him out.

And sometimes we discover the phone hidden in his drawer later on, and sometimes the staff member finds his phone was left in his bedroom and never taken to the office in the first place.

In the absence of verifiable evidence, let’s say a situation where one child is claiming the other took something and the other child is denying it, you really don’t know if there’s slander going on. 

Solomon’s famous example of how to deal with conflicting evidence is helpful, but I can tell you from personal experience that it doesn’t work all the time. Sometimes you just won’t ever know the Truth.

And maybe that means — with your kids — that you need to provide better accountability. Perhaps those two kids should not be allowed to be together without anyone else around until they’re more trustworthy. Who knows.

The point is, I acknowledge that sometimes it’s best not to give consequences if you aren’t 100% sure (with verifiable evidence) that the child is lying about what was said or done. 

But, when you are sure, you need to hold the child accountable. Slander is lying, and the child is using the slander to garner pity for his position. Remember, the one whom the child is slandering is the perceived source of their discomfort. The child wants you — whomever the child trying to convince — to be on their side.

Consider the opportunity cost and opportunity benefit of this situation. If your child has equal chances of you having pity on them or you giving them consequences for lying, how often will they choose to go ahead with the slander? This is especially true if their lies have previously been debunked.

If we don’t treat gossip and slander for what it is, if our kids don’t receive the just consequences of their sin, we’re encouraging their self-worship, we’re encouraging them to handle their conflicts the same way they always have.

Appropriate Secondary Consequences that remind them of the Primary Consequences and the discomfort felt by all the consequences combined is often far heavier than the discomfort felt by the mean girl at school.

So your daughter is tempted to tell you that Mean Girl didn’t invite her to the party when in actuality she did. The reality is that Mean Girl has been unkind in the past, but your daughter can’t stand her and was the one to start the unkindness. But then your daughter remembers that the last time she lied about something Mean Girl had done, you talked with the teacher and discovered that your daughter was lying, and she received the appropriate consequences for her lie — her temptation to slander Mean Girl may likely decrease.

Whereas, the more you believe her slander and allow her to get away with it, the more she’ll view it as a legitimate way of dealing with her conflict.

1. Slanderous children need to have their delusion confronted.
2. Slanderous Children need to experience the consequences of their slander.

And . . .

3. Slanderous children need Bible, not pragmatism.

It’s not really going to help to tell your child that no one is going to want to be their friend if they always lie about people. It’s not really going to help to say, "Your teachers aren’t going to trust you if you’re always telling tales about the other students.”

Sure, that kind of parenting may motivate the child to change their behavior in order to save their skin, but there’s no call to submission to God. There’s no call to Christ-centered repentance. 

So, what do your kids need to hear? Well, there’s a lot the Bible has to say on the subject . . . here are a couple examples:

I Timothy 6:3-5 teaches that slander (interpreted as “abusive language”) is the product of delusional living. God calls them conceited, says they understand nothing, have a morbid interest in controversy, and are depraved in mind and deprived of Truth. The main problem is that individuals who slander are calling God a liar and rejecting His will for their lives.

If your child argues that their enemy deserves it, you can talk about how the Bible teaches us to treat our enemies, and you can also turn to Jude 1:8-10. Jude relates an ancient account of how Michael and the Devil were arguing about Moses’ body, and Michael refused to slander (translated “railing judgement”) the Devil, but instead called on God to do the job. 

In that same passage, once again, the Bible identifies the source of the problem as being defiled individuals who reject authority acting like instinctual, unreasoning animals.

And Psalm 15 is powerful because it describes the type of person who has a strong relationship with God. It reads, “1 O Lord, who shall sojourn in your tent? Who shall dwell on your holy hill? 2 He who walks blamelessly and does what is right and speaks truth in his heart; 3 who does not slander with his tongue and does no evil to his neighbor, nor takes up a reproach against his friend.”

Once you’ve taught your child the high biblical expectations of God, you can hold them accountable to it. Instead of hurting people, the malicious child is taught to serve. Instead of lying about people, the slanderous child is taught to speak the Truth.

“Well, Aaron, that sounds conveniently easy.”

I’m not saying it is. In fact, we must remember what I said last time. In order to parent a slanderous child, I will need to know the specifics of a slanderous child, but I’ll also need to know how to work through the clamor, and anger, and wrath, and bitterness of the child’s heart.

Slander is merely the top layer. As we work down through our Angry Onion, we’ll be able to move past the symptomatic manifestations of anger and deal with the core of it.

So . . .

1. Slanderous children need to have their delusion confronted.
2. Slanderous Children need to experience the consequences of their slander, and . . .
3. Slanderous Children need Bible, not pragmatism.

Please don’t forget that we have free episode notes linked below. You never have to worry about this information not being accessible.

Conclusion

Now, let’s wrap this up for today.

What if, after taking the three steps we’ve outlined, your slanderous child seems repentant?

They should apologize for their sin. That would include apologizing for lying to you, but also include apologizing to the person whom they were trying to slander. They can apologize for the slander, but they can also apologize for being angry in the first place.

If they are willing to do that, you’re in a wonderful place. And I would make it a top priority to facilitate that conversation as soon as possible. I would not trust them to do it on their own.

However, you may find that they’re willing to apologize to you for lying, but they’re not interested in talking to the perceived source of their discomfort because they’re still mad at them. Well, then your child is inviting you to speak into that as well. 

My plan is to discuss clamor and anger together next time, so if they’re still angry, you can utilize the truth we’re going to study next time.

And once your child’s mind has been renewed, that’s when we can counsel them as to how to put off the anger and slander and how to put on Christ-honoring conflict management.

I know there’s a lot to put together. I know that it can sound clean and easy here only to find that it doesn’t seem to work at home.

Please, let me admonish you, sometimes you absolutely must get a third party involved. It’s not helping anyone if you’re too prideful to ask for help. 

And there is help. There is hope for a slanderous child.

Lord willing, next time we’ll see the help for children who yell a lot and those who are continually angry.

So, to that end, I’ll see you next time.