Trading a season for a lifetime

“A seemingly, simple season of two parents being disobedient to God’s will may result in a lifetime of their children running from the will of God. Our children need to see our obedience to God, more than they need to hear our opinions of life.”

Our children are watching

” I wonder how many children could have been salvaged if they had found real living, real love, and real laughter in the home.”

 

The Heart of our children

“May we plant in our children’s heart such a desire to know God, that when they grow older, the desire of their soul will be to know that same God in a far deeper way.”

Home that Flourishes

“An atmosphere of holiness and love in the home, inspires godliness, grace and goodness to flourish.”

Parent Trap

” The snare that entraps many parents, when it comes to training their children, is the snare of, inconsistency.”

What Every Parent Should Know

In Proverbs 22: 6 We find some words of wisdom to those who are raising a family. This wisdom, from thousands of years ago, is still a foundation for every husband and wife whom God has blessed with an “heritage” from the Lord. In this passage we are reminded that there is a need to “train up our children in the way that they should go”. This is such a valuable proverb for the health of our home and the strength of generations to come. 

When I think of training, I think of the philosophy of the military. The military will take raw recruits, from many different backgrounds, and will train them how to be a first-class fighting machine. Most would know very little about weaponry, combat, and the logistics of battle before they came. The goal of those in charge is to graduate these recruits as men and women who are ready to face whatever foes may come their way. They will take these recruits and try to purge them of every weakness and characteristic that would be an hindrance to them being successful. Then they will train them to be fit, mentally and physically, to perform the duties ahead. This is hard work for those training as well as the trainees. They have the wonderful philosophy of “no pain, no gain”.

Certainly, we are not to treat our children like they are a soldier, but the philosophy of training still would apply. God has loaned our children to us and has given us the responsibility of training them in the “nurture and admonition” of the Lord. Then, we are to present them back to God when our duty is finished. If we as parents could remind ourselves that our children are ultimately not ours, but God’s, it should change our mindset of how we raise them. We are raising them in God’s stead and for God’s glory. Every decision that we make in their life should be to make them what Christ would want them to be. If we would recognize that, would that not make a difference in how we train our children. We would want to present them back to God,holy, pure, and and desirous to please the Lord. This will take some hard work on our part. If I make the choice that I am going to raise my children in the “nurture and admonition of the Lord” then I am going to have to decide to use the Word of God as my manual. I would like to use a few lessons to encourage us in how we can focus in on training our children biblically.

Let’s see some key acknowlegements to attain this godly training.

1. There must be a PROGRAM to follow.   Where do we get this program? From Dr. Spock? From the philosophy of the world? God has given us the program if we are willing to find it, accept it, and follow it. Scripture gives us mandates, proverbs, principles and promises all filled with the wisdom of God to help simple people like you and me to perform a duty that we cannot perform on our own. It would be good for every young parent to make a journal of every scripture that deals with raising our children. We could daily remind ourselves of these nuggets of wisdom and ask God to give us the strength to apply them. The sad reality with many parents is that they are satisfied if their kids grow up and are not a great burden. We should ask ourselves whether our program for training is geared to raise good children or godly children.

2. There must be a PURGING of hindrances.  We must eliminate any hindrances that will be a stumbling block to raising godly children. Sometimes those hindrance can be in the life of the parent and sometimes they can be in the life of the children. For parents,laziness can be a great hindrance. It can lead to frustration on the parents part and insecurity on the child’s part. For the child, an unbroken will is always an hindrance. Many times the surrendering of their will is the only thing keeping them from learning, growing and having a submissive spirit. It may be good for parents to make a list of these hindrances on both sides so that prayer can be made for these issues and special attention can be given to work on these problems. It is an eyeopener to see how little hindrances can become major issues if they are not dealt with quickly. A whinny attitude can soon blossom into a defiant attitude. Purge these through love, prayer and discipline.

3. There must be a PASSION for CONSISTENCY.  Consistency is probably the greatest problem facing good parents in properly training their children. The “little fox” of letting our children get away with something one day and then chastising them for the same the next is often what is “spoiling the vine”. It gives such a mixed message with our children and brings them confusion. Often parents will only discipline when they finally get irritated over something. If we are truly training our children then we want to take their hindrances and consistently hammer away and try to remove those problems. Consistent discipline, backed up with love, gives our children safety and comfort. Most issues of tantrums, back talking, crying to get their way, fighting, etc., could be turned around in a week if dealt with in a consistent manner. 

4.  There must be PATIENCE in difficult areas.  “We must have as much patience with our children’s faults as they have with our failures.” We need to patiently love them and listen to them. Someone said, “Your children need your presence more than your presents.” Time spent with them shows that you are interested in problems they are dealing with. We see a lot better results in difficult areas when we patiently work on the issues at hand and prayerfully show our children how God seeks for them to live.