The “Umbrella of Protection” and the Damage It Causes Adults Raised Under It

I just finished reading Jill Duggar Dillard’s book, Counting the Cost, and I have a lot of thoughts.  This is going to be less of a book review and just some observations after reading both her book and her sister’s book and personal contact with some IBLP families.  On the book, it was good.  Nothing in it surprised me from what I know of IBLP.  I felt she was much more charitable towards her parents than I thought she would be.  She clearly still loves them, and the hurt is deep from her father’s actions. 

The thing that stands out to me the most is that a lot of what she struggled with is due to the “Umbrella of Protection” idea that is one of the cornerstones of IBLP teachings.  If you aren’t familiar with it, a graphic is below. Under this idea, the father and his wishes are supreme, and he must be obeyed without question. After all, God placed him in authority over you, and to question what he says is akin to disobeying God.  And if you disobey him, you will put yourself at risk of the Devil getting to you, because you are outside of your father’s protection, and this extends to being outside of God’s protection as well.

This idea is used very effectively in IBLP circles to keep children obedient to parents, especially the father, and as some have observed, the umbrella has no clear end point wherein you have your own umbrella.  Single adults and even married children are expected to seek their parents’ blessing on decisions in some families, and to not follow what they say is considered a sin.  I have seen this play out several times with people we have been around.  In one case, a young lady of our acquaintance was in a courtship relationship with a man, and her father happened to tell the young man that he expected to still have authority over things that happened with his daughter even after they married.  It probably won’t surprise anyone that this man walked away from the relationship.  Last I checked, this poor young lady was still single.  (This happened when my kids weren’t even teenagers yet, so this was awhile ago.) In several other cases, unmarried adult daughters who were living away from their parents were pressured to come home because it was wrong for them to be living away from a male authority.  I have also seen many adult males stay at home into their late 20’s, unable to step out and take care of themselves and find a way to support themselves financially. It seems most of them cannot make decisions for themselves because they have spent so much time having the idea that Dad’s decisions are best hammered into their heads and have not been forced to make the shift into being independent adults.

Jill Duggar indicated in her book that she always wanted to be the perfect, obedient daughter. After all, the "Umbrella of Protection" was crucial to her staying safe. But over time, it became clear that the expectation that she and her husband do her father’s bidding was wrong and they needed to stand on their own two feet.  It has to be hard, especially for those children who have more compliant, agreeable personalities to realize that they can still love and honor their parents while still being their own people and making their own decisions relating to items of conscience and Christian liberty.  It is NOT a sin for an adult to make a decision on something like wearing pants, certain types of jewelry, how to educate their children, etc., and do things differently from their parents. And it makes me sad that so many young adults raised under this Umbrella of Protection doctrine ultimately feel like they were actually anything but protected, and they have a lot of years of anxiety and fear induced by this unbiblical idea to unravel.  And rest assured, it is definitely unbiblical. 

The reality is, if you are a believer, there is NOTHING you can do to place yourself outside of God’s protection. He is sovereign, even over mistakes we make and the consequences of those mistakes. As a parent, I don’t withdraw my love and care for my children when they don’t do exactly what I want them to. God doesn’t do that either.  I’ve always been taught that once I am redeemed, God looks at me and sees the righteousness of Christ.  The “Umbrella of Protection” teaches the opposite (and is, in my opinion, works based, having to stay in line to keep God’s favor) creating a fear in conscientious children that lasts into adulthood that they might do something to lose God’s favor.  From what I see, this creates a lot of anxiety, and in some, this anxiety is crippling.  How sad that their parents bought into this doctrine and used the fear associated with it to get their children to do what they wanted them to do, even into adulthood.

I have talked to my children about this a lot, especially the last year or so.  We have always left it up to them to figure out what God wants them to do with their lives, and they have our blessing to do whatever He has for them to do, even if we might do things differently.  They can ask our advice, but they don’t need us to sign off on whatever it is in order to do it.  We will always be there for them, because we love them. I cannot force my adult children to do things my way if I want to have any kind of relationship with them. And as adults, they can walk away from us whenever they choose to, because we don't have any legal authority over them past age 18.  We recently helped our youngest move 9 hours away from us to the Midwest, and it was honestly less hard than I thought it would be.  Not saying it wasn’t hard to say goodbye and that we don’t miss her, but a LOT of prayers from a lot of faithful prayer warriors went into where she landed after a long job search, leaving the results up to God.  I couldn’t be more proud of her for being willing to go where God sends her, and that helps me as a mom know that God is not only in control, He is protecting her there just as much as He did when she was in our home.  It is the same situation with our other two girls.  They have some options, none of which involve staying here (not because they don’t get along with us, there are a lot of different variables.) At the end of the day, as long as they go where God sends them, I can happily accept the next step in life even while I miss them being around.  It isn’t up to me to lock them up and use works and fear-based ideas made up by a man twisting scripture to keep my children under my thumb for a lifetime.

The good news is, there is help out there for those struggling with "Umbrella of Protection" related fear and anxiety.  If you or someone you know have issues because of this, I urge you to seek professional Christian counseling in order to move past the anxiety and find peace following God yourself without worrying about whether your parents approve of your choices or not.  There is no scriptural requirement for adults to continue under parental authority, and it is better to follow God rather than man, even if you love said man (and woman) because you know they did the best they knew how in raising you. Life is too short to let this kind of fear and anxiety dominate every day of your existence.