Parents - this works!

So the thing that they say happens has now happened. When your children are small everyone speaks of how time flies by and before you know it they are grown up. Well, recently our eldest son celebrated his 22^ndbirthday and this gives me pause to reflect on the past 22 years as a parent. The thought that floated to the top of my mind is this:

The principles that we have been teaching over the last few decades and living in our own family for the past few decades work. 

Of course they are God’s principles so there is no surprise there. But the proof of the pudding is in the eating as they say and as we taught these principles we were aware that at times they were in direct conflict with the suggestions in the world on how parenting should be done.

So I make no apologies in sharing with you the top 3 things that we have intentionally worked on over the years as a family – knowing that these three things will work for any family, from any culture. That’s the beauty of God’s principles they are timeless.

Firstly – the foundation we give our children matters. Our foundation for parenting and for every aspect of life should be the word of God. We’ve been intentional in sharing, bringing children into church community, praying for them and creating space for them to encounter the Lord for themselves. Foundations matter, they are not accidental and we must be deliberate in placing our foundations firmly on the Lord (and only the Lord). This will impact every decision we make as a family and every way we work together.

Secondly – the family. Family matters and we should prioritize our family over all other pursuits, except for our pursuit of the Lord. We chose to home educate our children from birth until the age of 16. It was a huge sacrifice compared to the alternative, and ro be honest there were many moments when we thought we must be crazy, but the fruit of investing so heavily in our family is seen in our children.

Finally – faith is the most important thing.  We acknowledge that we could have placed our children on a solid foundation and prioritized the family, but this does not guarantee that they will choose to follow the Lord when they are older. These are the things that God has given for us to do, but we are totally dependent on the Lord to encounter our children and guide them into all that He has for them.

There have definitely been seasons in each of our children’s lives where we have had to cry out to God more for His mercy to intervene, for wisdom, for shaping of their character (and ours) and for avoidance of the dangers the enemy has laid for them. ‘A season is not a life sentence,’ is a word of encouragement we share with parents and ourselves alike! The life sentence is the call of God on their lives, which he knew before they were born.

There lives have not always been perfect, but the Lord has brought them through. Our trust is in Him – as he asys in Psalm 127, ‘unless the Lord builds the house they labour in vain that build it, unless the Lord guards the city the watchman stay awake in vain.’ Whatever we do as parents, let us never forget that we are reliant on the Lord’s mercy and grace for our family to follow Him.

You might not see results in the short term, but the fruit in the long term will be good. We’ve always said that we do not want to raise children who simply survive church, we want to raise the future giants of the church. And if you are having one of those days where it feels like you are going more backwards than forward then be encouraged – set your foundation, focus on your family and have faith that the Lord will bring you all through.