No More Grumbles: How I learned to trust God, stop acting helpless, and be a better example to my kids

So my family and I did a pretty dumb thing. We decided to take on a challenge not to grumble for a year. We chronicled the highs and the lows (lots of lows) in my upcoming release The Grumble Free Year.

Here are the top three realities I had to face before I could help anyone with their grumbles.

1. We’re not as smart as we think we are. We have it in our minds that we know the best way for our life, our family, our days. Whether we are big picture thinkers and have our year planned out—or we just want the next hour to go as planned—we think we know the best way it should happen. Then, when our plans don’t happen we complain, as if our way was better than God’s.

During our grumble-free year, my Grandma broke her back, and I became her full-time caregiver. That was definitely NOT on my list of ways to teach my kids not to grumble. Yet seeing my grandma unable to sit up, and hearing her praise in the midst of her pain, was the best lesson for my kids. As hard as it was to go through that season, I’m thankful for my grandma’s recovery, my own self-discovery, and the lessons on praise in the midst of hardship that my children learned.

2. We’re not as helpless as we think we are. Instead of complaining, we can often make positive changes within our home. It’s easy to complain about a messy house. It’s harder to make (and enforce) a chore chart … at least at first. But we’re not helpless. We can figure out systems. We can train our kids. (They’ll thank you in the long run.)

Whenever I find myself going back to my grumbling ways I pause and ask, “What is one way we can fix this?” Even recently I found myself overwhelmed and grumbling about making dinner for eleven people every night. As I thought about a solution I decided to spend one Saturday prepping thirty dinners to put in the freezer. It was a lot of work, but my kids helped, and they actually enjoyed our busy cooking day. Now I’m thankful, not grumbling, when I pull a meal out for dinner, because I figured out what would work for our family in this season of life.

3. We’re not as good of an example as we believe we are. When my family took on the goal of having a grumble free year, my plan was to come up with some cool activities that would help bring light to my kids grumbling ways. But what I discovered was that I was a horrible example, and nothing was going to change with them unless I made the changes first.

When I took a good look at myself, I didn’t like what I saw. And when I read God’s Word, and started taking note of those who grumbled and complained, I was humbled. For example, in the book of Exodus God wanted to give the people freedom, but their path to the Promised Land led through a desert. And on the way to having their prayers answered they complained so much that not only didn’t get to enjoy the land of their freedom, they died in the very desert they complained about. 

What happen to those who complained? God took offense, and the people paid the price. Their actions became an example to me of what not to do. And the amazing thing is, the more I stopped complaining and instead looked to God and thanked him for his provision, the kids starting mimicking me. They picked up on acting right and being thankful, who would have imagined that?

To sum up our whole year, what I realized is our mumbling words often point to a discontent heart.

            “God, why didn’t you...”

            “God, why don’t you ...”

            “God, if only you would ...”

My disbelief was dishonoring to God. Yet when I started to trust Him—and when I started solving problems and became a good example—everything changed. The change wasn’t just noticeable in our home, but also in our hearts. And that has made every hard moment worth it.

Blessings,

Tricia Goyer

The Goyer home—made up of two parents, eight kids, and one grandmother with dementia—is never without noise, mess, and, often, complaining. And it’s not just the kids grumbling. Adopting seven children in less than six years has been an adjustment, but it’s time to move out of survival-mode and into growth-mode. So the family decides to tackle the impossible: a grumble-free year. What could possibly go awry?

The Grumble-Free Year follows the Goyers as they go complaint-free and discover what it looks like to develop hearts of gratitude. They share their plans, successes, failures, and all the lessons learned along the way, offering not only a front-row seat to the action but also real-life steps for uncovering hearts that are truly thankful.

Read the first chapter and get more information HERE!