Posts Tagged ‘Family’
Strategic Friendships for Our Children
Saturday, January 14th, 2012Much has been said about the importance of strategic friendships among men and women in the work of the Kingdom of God, to which I would whole heartedly agree. But what about strategic friendships for our children? How should this look? How should this play out?
In this article, I would like to take a different approach and look at the value of strategic friendships in our children’s lives, in a Biblically ordered church setting where peer culture and age segregation are not the norm.
The subject has been on my heart, so last week I sat down with my two oldest daughters, Naomi (17), and Anna (15), on separate occasions for a daddy daughter talk on the subject of friendship. I simply asked… who are your best friends? The answers they gave were both without hesitation, that their mother and one another were their best friends. This was a fact I already knew because it is both verbalized on a regular basis and demonstrated in practice daily.
My desire; however, was to get outside the walls of our home, to the other people that they considered close friends.
What happened next was a deep encouragement to my soul as a father. Both of my daughters lists of closest friends included 5 ladies ranging from as young as age 13 to two women over 50 and a few in between. I thought to myself, how wonderful that they both had godly young women whom they could treat as sisters and older women whom they could treat as mothers (1 Timothy 5:2) and receive the kind of influence that Titus 2 models for us.
I know that to some, what I have just said is weird and they may immediately think that surely my children need more friends their own age. On the contrary, I want to say how marvelous it is to be a part of a church family that allows for both young and old to grow in Christ and community together. A church where it is not abnormal to see a 17 year old praying with or visiting with a 13 year old or a fifty year old. Nor is it freakish to hear a 15 year old list off a woman who has three adult children as one of her dearest friends.
I believe that is the way God intended friendships to be. Older friends that can invest wisdom of years into the life of the younger, who in turn, are often encouraged and invigorated in their own lives because of the friendships that flourish with these younger ladies.
The reality of these kind of strategic friendships is that they are wonderful for both men and women, young and old. These friendships that flourish have also been a blessing to me as a pastor. It has been one of the greatest joys of my life to have other men of God, who are old enough to be my father, befriend me, challenge me, pray for me, and rebuke me on occasion. I also have friends that are young men, new husbands, and new fathers that desire to grow into men of God who lead well.
May God help strategic friendships to flourish in our Biblically ordered homes and churches.
Iron sharpeneth iron; So a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend.
Proverbs 27:17
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Tags: Beauty, Church, Daughters, Family, Friendship
Family – A Noble Business
Sunday, December 18th, 2011“…the business done in the home is nothing less than the shaping of the bodies and souls of humanity. The family is the factory that manufactures mankind.”
Brave New Family, by G.K. Chesterton
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Tags: Family, Great Quotes
How to Help Children Love Bible Study
Monday, February 28th, 2011How to Teach Your Children to Study the Bible
Deuteronomy 31:12-13
When our small group Bible Study began a few years ago, I asked those in attendance what topics they were interested in studying and one that came up in several different ways was the subject of How to study the Bible.
One of the lessons I taught was on the need to teach your children how to study the Bible. So these are the slightly edited notes from that Bible Study.
Parents Must Model Personal Bible Study
Proverbs 22:6 Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.
Some things are better caught then taught. In other words, if we say to our children read your Bible but we do not train them by modeling faithful Bible study in our own lives, our children will most likely be provoked to wrath (Eph 6:4) because they see our testimony as fake. Dads and moms, you need to know that being authentic is important in raising your children. They will most often do what you really do, which we all know is sometimes a tough pill to swallow.
If you are a single mother trying to raise a son or daughter who loves Jesus, don’t lose hope because the situation isn’t God’s best. Strive to by like Eunice, Timothy’s mother, who passed on, with the help of her mother Lois, an unfeigned (sincere, not fake) faith to her son Timothy. 2 Timothy 1:1-7
Parents Must Lead in Family Bible Study (family altar)
The key with family Bible study is to keep it simple, real, regular, and involve the children.
Read and teach the Bible to your family 2 Tim 3:14-15
Have each child share what they have learned and apply it to life.
Pray together
Other things can be added to family altar/Bible study, such as:
Praise the Lord in Song and thanksgiving
Bible memory
Working together on their Bible study lessons from church
Bible Trivia game etc.
Parents Must Disciple the Family with the Bible
Deuteronomy 6:1-10
We must raise our children with God at the center of all of life not just the spiritual part because all of life should be spiritual. That is the principle of Deuteronomy 6 which is the Hebrew discipleship passage that all children would be raised to know. This is why it not just important to model personal Bible study or to have family Bible study, but to live out your life Biblically with pleasing Christ as the number one objective in everything that you do. That way your children see not just church life, but family finances, business practices, political ideology, education, social life, and even recreation as things that must been done to the Glory of God and there is no way to do that we without studying what God’s word says about every topic. 1 Corinthians 10:31
Do you want your children to love Jesus? Then love Jesus!
Do you want your children to love people who need Jesus?
Then love people who need Jesus!
To often children raised in Christian homes (maybe better put church going homes) do not desire to follow Christ because their parents said they loved Jesus and went to church faithfully, but otherwise lived their lives like everyone else. Their passion was not for Jesus and the people of the World who needed to know Him. Their passion was for the World.
May we live our lives in such a way that our children know that even though we sin and are in constant need of the mercy and grace of God that our love for Christ and our love for people is real. Which when you boil it all down the point of the Bible especially Deuteronomy 6 and the greatest commandment that Jesus gave us in Matthew 22:34-40 is what really matters anyway.
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Tags: Bible Study, Family, Parenting
Daughters of Influence
Thursday, January 27th, 2011Daughters of Influence (Palaces)
The Psalmist in 144:12 concludes the picture of glorious womanhood that God has designed for our daughters with the importance of her influence. She is to be a cornerstone, polished after the similitude of a PALACE. The godly woman’s influence has the potential to be far greater then even a household, but over palaces which belong to kings. (now true enough every mans house is his castle but this speaks of more than that).
Think of Ruth whom God redeemed through Boaz, whose name means standing in strength and would later be the name a one of the pillars of Solomon’s temple. Who besides God was a key cornerstone of influence in the life of Boaz whom that pillar in palace was named after? Ruth! Did she only effect her husband, mother in law Naomi, and Obed? I think not for she is listed for generations to see that God placed this beautiful polished cornerstone in the linage of Christ. Now when you think about her background as a Moabite girl from a despised people it is truly glorious to see the wonderful grace of God use someone with whom no one else would use not only to influence a few, but to influence generations of people around the earth including you and I today.
The statement “the hand that rocks the cradle rules the world” is truly an understatement.
A Strong, Beautiful, Women in the hands of God will not just impact a single home but entire kingdoms of this World. Most importantly they have an amazing opportunity to impact the Kingdom of God.
Influence Kingdoms through helping fulfill the vision of your husband – The heart of her husband safely trust. Prov 31
Influence Kingdoms by raising children who are equipped in mind, body and spirit.
Influence Kingdoms by being a totally committed follower of Christ.
Women of great influence in the BIBLE
Ruth,
Sarah,
Queen Ester,
Prov 31 women who raised King Lemuel
Mary the mother of Jesus
God has Hopeful Expectations for each His daughters to fulfill. It is time to realize and embrace God’s call and plan for your life to be women of Strength, Beauty and Influence. Not for the plans of man, but the plans of your loving heavenly Father.
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Tags: Daughters, Family, Fatherhood, Parenting, Women
Daughters of Strength
Wednesday, December 1st, 2010Daughters of Strength (Cornerstones)
Psalm 144:12 That our sons may be as plants grown up in their youth; and that our daughters may be as corner stones, polished after the similitude of a palace:
Daughters are likened unto corner stones which are not pictures of weakness! They are descriptions of STRENGTH!
Christian fathers and mothers, we must reject the image that the World has placed in our minds of Christian womanhood that is some form of abusive slavery fit only for weak minded women. It is an absolute lie that a woman who is a Godly keeper at home is weak or abused.
The Christian woman, rightly understood, is to be one who is raised to be as a cornerstone which is not an insignificant part of a building, but it is distinctly set apart as a tool for building the home or building upon. In fact, we find in Scripture, Christ referred to as the Cornerstone of the Church. This is vitally important for the church, as is the significance of a woman in the future building of a new home when she is married.
The key to a woman’s great strength is in the primary place where her strength is to be executed, which is the home.
I beg of you not to under estimate the strength that you have to impact your family and the people around you through a well ordered home and family.
Strength in the Home as a place of Hospitality 2 John; Titus 1:8; Rom 12:13; 1 Pet 4:9;
Strength in the Home as a place of Ministry and Evangelism Acts 16:11-15; 40; Mark
Strength in the Home as a place of Teaching Children Prov 1:8; Prov 31:1-9
Strength in the Home as a place of Industry and Profitability Ruth2:7,17,23; Prov 31:14-18
To be continued….
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Tags: Family, Fatherhood, Strength, Woman
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