Shepherding a Child's Heart Week 3

Julia and I at her 2nd birthday party, can you believe she is 2??

This Sunday's class was such a blessing to John and I! We finally got to sit together in class since the past 2 weeks some little one of ours has been ill. It was very cute because all the questions I asked last week in class, John asked this week. Thank you Linda and John for being patient with us new parents...we are learning! Slowly but surely! Linda and John are so wise...here's what we learned/discussed in class this past Sunday:

Children are shaped by their outward influences.

*Structure of Family Life
*Family Values
*Family Roles
*Family Problem Solving
*Dealing with Failure
*Family History
*Education
*Neighbors/Extended Family

Some of these influences we have control over but many we do not. What I got out of the video and our class talk was that sometimes as parents we try to control so much of the outward influences instead of really trusting God's power over our family. A lot of parents try to create this christian bubble over their children and think that this will automatically produce christian children, but that is not the case at all. We are definitely responsible to teach our children God's truth, and God's law, and show them by example how to live for Christ. We need to teach them the fear and admonition of the Lord. But we are not to become behaviorists and focus on outward behavior. Remember our goal is our children's hearts. We want our children to see God's truth and love God's Word and have soft hearts towards Him. When we say to them, "All that matters is you do your best." and they come home with a C on their report card and we rant and rave, then we are caring more about their grade than their heart/best.

We also talked about Godward Orientation. We discussed that children are worshippers and that as humans we love to be dazzeled! Look at how we watch the olympics or sports...we love to be awed by what we can do. As parents we want our children to be worshippers of God, not idols. We went over a lot of scripture where all the focus is on God as the Creator. We need to be careful over what we idolize. Because children watch to see what we praise and get all excited about. Children are wonderful imitators...a bit scary, huh? I can get awfully excited about a new pair of shoes...do I get that excited about a great verse, or what God has done in my life?

Here are some great pieces of Scripture to just worship the Lord to:

*Psalm 145-I will exalt you my God, Great is the Lord...
*Psalm 4-Let the light of your face shine on us...
*Psalm 27-The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear?...
*Psalm 36-Your love reaches us, You preserve both man and beast...in the shadow of your wings...fountain of life...
*Psalm 73-God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever...
*Psalm 63-My soul thirsts for you!
*Isaiah 55:2-My soul will delight in you...

I am amazed at how much this class is teaching me about my heart and my weaknesses...being a good parent is all about surrendering to God and truly asking Him to change our own heart and sinful ways so that we can show our children God's absolute best...it is very humbling, but very good and very exciting to see God work in our lives!