In-Laws or Outlaws?

I had him all picked out: a fine, Christian boy for my beloved daughter to marry. He was handsome, polite, and his family were fine, upstanding members of our church. Of course, my daughter was in college and had years of education ahead of her before such dreams could be realized, but there was no harm in dreaming, I told myself happily.

The phone rang and I picked it up to hear Judy’s excited voice. “Mom, can I bring a friend home for the weekend?”

“Of course,” I answered without hesitation. “I’ll make up the other bed in your room.”

"No, Mom… It’s a boyfriend.” So began my initiation into the experience of "mother-in-law-dom." Through the years of prayer, I learned truths of establishing positive in-law relationships.

1.  I needed to relinquish my dreams and accept reality.

A mother’s unrealistic expectations can be a burden too heavy for your child’s future spouse to bear. I also had to trust that God would intervene if this particular relationship was not what He had in mind. Hadn’t we, Judy’s parents, prayed all these years that God would prepare the right partner for her?

2.  I needed to exercise disciplines in my thought life.

I clearly had a choice to think positively or negatively about my daughter’s choice. Philippians 4:8 reminded me to make a mental list of all the “noble, right, pure, lovely, and admirable” qualities about this stranger intruding into our lives, and “think on these things.”

3.  I rolled up my spiritual sleeves and committed myself to hard work.

Building relationships, especially these relationships, would require effort and initiative on my part. Knowing that all relationships need time and space to develop, I got on my knees and asked God to help me develop a plan. I pled with Him to give me creative ideas that would work, and I came out of that prayer time with the determination to invite my future son-in-law (as he turned out to be) for a pancake breakfast at a restaurant nearby. I armed myself with a compliment to give him, and during the meal said, “Greg, I want to thank you for the way you show your love to Judy—you treat her like a queen!” I may have embarrassed him (in fact, I did), but it was a happy embarrassment and led to a habit on my part of verbalizing appreciation for the way he acted toward Judy.

As our other two children met and married their mates, I had plenty of opportunities to practice my attitude of gratitude. Each time, there was a struggle in my mother heart to let go and let God teach me the lessons I needed to learn.

I told our daughter, once she was married, that she needed to work out conflicts with her husband and warned her that I would take his side first if I was asked for an opinion. Shortly after they got married, she called me from the other side of the country.

“We’ve had a row,” she said.

It took everything I had to say, “Does Greg know you’re calling me—if not, I can’t talk to you!”

“He told me to call you,” she sobbed into the phone. “He said, ‘I can’t figure you out—maybe your mother can!”

I am still finding out that all our in-law relationships need space to breathe and room to grow, and that they need to be bathed in prayer and lived in the power of the Holy Spirit. I am discovering that the devil hates family and is the “accuser of the brethren” (Rev. 12:10), and I have determined not to do his work for him. As our family grows and the grandchildren come along, there is abundant opportunity to “keep in step with the Spirit” (Gal. 5:25), stretch the boundaries of my faith, and above all, grow up in the matter of loving and giving.

Jesus’ great desire for His own is that we “may be one” (John 17:11); that includes mother-in-laws and son-and-daughter-in-laws. May He, looking at us, see His prayers answered, and may a watching world that knows not God see us handling difficult relationships in the power of Jesus and ask, “How is it that these Christians love one another?”