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Archive for parenting tips

train up a child

Train up a child: parenting toward wisdom one building block at a time

Posted by Carey 
· Friday, November 23rd, 2012 

Train up a child toward wisdom, one building block at a time…

You have great dreams for your child. You are eager to see them become all that God desires them to be. Me too.

But those dreams don’t just happen… they come about through intentionality and hard work on your part. They come through understanding that to train up a child it will be a process of intentionally forming their thoughts, beliefs, and outlook on life, one purposeful building block at a time.

Don’t misunderstand, you are to train your child in the way THEY should go, which accounts for their personality. Nevertheless, you are to train them in the way they SHOULD go, which means you are to determine the course (as the LORD leads you).

Imagine it this way: You have a dream, a desired end in mind for your child. You are parenting them toward where you prayerfully want to see them be in terms of character, love for the LORD, maturity, wisdom, etc. You get there through intentional training, like building blocks, that you put into place over time. As the blocks stack up, one by one over time, your child will be rising toward the dream you (and God) have in mind.

BUILDING BLOCKS TO TRAIN UP A CHILD

I want to give you 4 areas of focus that you HAVE to put in place in your home if you want to train up a child in regards to wisdom. And notice one thing… none of them are one-time events. They are ongoing, repeated, front-and-center priorities you must revisit day after day.

train up a child

train up a child* A real-life example of a Jesus freak

All of us do better in attaining a goal if we know what it looks like. Your children are not different. They need to see you, their parent, passionate about Jesus. Not just in words, but in actions. The way you treat them needs to reflect Jesus. The way you treat their other parent needs to be an imitation of Him. The attitudes you express toward the world beyond your front door need to echo Jesus’ attitude. In short, you begin to train up your child by first training yourself to be a sold-out, devoted follower of Christ. If you try to skip this step, you’ll have a revolt on your hands later on.

train up a child* Scripture saturation & accompanying conversations

This is Deuteronomy 6:4-8. Your children need to hear you reading the word to them, hear you talking about the word with them, and having you lead them in conversations about the word of God. If they were prick you, you need to bleed Bible. And guess, what? In time, they will too. You need to saturate your home with it, and teach your children how to read and understand how it applies to their lives. That means you have to take it to a practical level, one that addresses the issues they face at their given age and stage of life. And you need to speak about how it penetrates to the heart level… which leads to the next building block…

train up a child* Heart-level conversations regarding outlook, motives, and desires

When you ask your child why she hit her sister, and she says, “I don’t know,” she’s telling the truth. She doesn’t know… her own heart or her own reasons for why she does what she does. She doesn’t understand things like fleshly behavior and the war between flesh and the Spirit. She doesn’t understand her need for Christ. You have to teacher her about those things. You have to engage in heart-level conversations with her about the depravity of her own heart and the wonderful grace of Christ to forgive, cleanse, and empower. In that process, you need to help her understand why she looks at situations the way she does, why she does what she does, and why she desires what she does. You’ll have to use words like “selfish” and “proud” and “inconsiderate” – and you should… all with a loving parent’s heart to help your child know themselves so that they can see their great need for Christ.

[dropshadowbox align=”right” effect=”lifted-both” width=”250px” height=”” background_color=”#f9e82a” border_width=”1″ border_color=”#000000″ ]There is no such thing as gossip when you are training your children. TWEET THIS[/dropshadowbox]

train up a child* Labels for things that need labels

A new friend of mine recently said, “There is no such thing as gossip when you are training your children.” What he meant was that as a parent, you MUST talk with your child about the reality of what happens between them and other people. You must point out wrong motives and wrong behavior, whether in your child or another person. You must use every situation as an example from which your child can learn and gain wisdom, under your guidance. When something that is done or said is sinful, you must label it as sin. When something that is done or said is pleasing to the LORD, you must label it as such. Your kids need to learn their definitions of things from you, as you are informed and guided by the scriptures and by the Spirit of God. And in all of this, you must continue to teach them that the people you are critiquing are loved by God and should be loved by the two of you as well. And you must teach them that there, but for the grace of God, go your children. If you’re not careful to do this last step, you’ll raise little Pharisees.

train up a child* Practical opportunities for them to grow, rather than excuses why they can’t

Your kids need to have opportunities in which to put their new-found skills into practice. They need the be able to fail and to learn from the failure. At the early stages this may mean teaching them boundaries about what they can touch and play with and what they can’t. Watch as they reach toward the electrical socket, and lovingly swat their hand and say, “NO.” Allow them practical opportunities in which to learn and embrace your wisely given boundaries instead of removing the temptations. Don’t child-proof your house. Instead teach your children about the protection and wisdom that boundaries and God-given authority bring.

Building Blocks that train up a child

Wisdom is not bestowed, it is learned. Your consistent, day by day training of your child in how he should think is essential. You do it through your own radical commitment to the LORD, a focus on the word of God, heart level conversations, a willingness to label and discuss the things that happen around you, and by allowing them practical opportunities to apply what they are being taught.

What ways have you found to train up a child in wisdom?

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Categories : Parenting
Tags : Christian parenting, parenting, parenting help, parenting tips, train up a child

Teach your children well, but make sure you are actually teaching

Posted by Carey 
· Friday, October 19th, 2012 

To teach your children well it’s about more than correction

A few days back Mindi and I had a conversation about an interaction I had with our son Caleb while we were eating dinner. After 15 minutes of muddling through our differing perceptions of what had happened, I discovered that while trying to teach Caleb something, I didn’t truly instruct him at all. Here’s the scenario… (time warp back to the dinner table)

teach your children well

I had just said the “Amen” to our dinner time prayer, and food was being passed around the table. Caleb was sitting next to me. When I finished dishing rice onto my plate, I turned to hand it to Caleb.
He was busy buttering his bread. When I looked over to see what was going on, I saw him there, bread in one hand, knife with butter in the other, carefully applying it to his bread. I didn’t think he noticed that I was holding out the rice bowl to him (and it was beginning to get a bit heavy).

Here’s what went through my mind…

Caleb isn’t being very considerate here… his bread-buttering should wait so that he can take the heavy bowl.
So with that nano-second of reasoning I somewhat sternly said, “Caleb. Take the rice!” Honestly, I wasn’t irritated or trying to be selfish. I was genuinely intending to instruct my son about consideration.

He took the rice bowl and we went on with our dinner conversation.

To teach your children well, let God teach you

The LORD used my conversation with Mindi to help me realize that in my own head, I was wanting Caleb to learn something about consideration, but I never communicated a word of that to him.

For all I know, he could have been thinking,

“Man, Dad is sure stressed about a bowl of rice.”

Or worse,

“Dad is always so short and bossy. I feel like he’s always irritated with me.”

That leads me to the most important thing I realized…

When no explanation is given for a stern, short, or intense remark, the person hearing it will take it negatively 99.9% of the time.

When it comes to kids, it’s probably 100%.

And because I’m “Dad,” it makes me less approachable in their minds, because I’m unreasonable.

Some lessons learned

  • If I felt Caleb needed to learn something, it needed to be explained.
  • More communication would have been very helpful (see the next heading).
  • There was no need to be tense or short. He wasn’t intentionally ignoring me.
  • I have GOT to be more careful with my tone. The last thing I want is for my kids to feel I’m unapproachable.

The follow-up conversation

teach your children wellAt Mindi’s suggestion (she’s always been a great help to me in this way) I went to talk with Caleb about the situation. He remembered it. I told him that I was feeling concerned at the time that he assess the situation and do what seemed most considerate. I didn’t expect the response I got. Here’s what he said…

I did think about what seemed best, and I thought that since I had a knife full of butter and bread already in my hand, it would be O.K. for me to get that finished. I figured you’d just set the bowl down on the table until I was able to take it.

I learned a couple of things in that conversation too:

  • His reasoning about the situation was just as good as mine.
  • He was assuming maturity in me, while I was not assuming the best about him.
  • It could be that I was the one being inconsiderate.

I want to make sure that I’m opening up my child’s heart instead of locking it down. That’s what good communication, and good instruction does. – Click to tweet this

I want to make sure that I’m opening up my child’s heart instead of locking it down. That’s what good communication, and good instruction does. That is how you can teach your children well!

Tell me what you struggle with in this area… is enough communication happening?

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Categories : Parenting
Tags : Christian marriage, Christian parenting, communication with children, correction, discipline, family communication, instructing kids, parenting tips, teach your children well, teaching children
child discipline

Child discipline – what’s going on under the surface

Posted by Carey 
· Friday, October 5th, 2012 

Child discipline – what’s going on under the surface

child discipline

photo: by GerryT on Flickr

Do you know what’s going on under the surface when you are disciplining your child? If you don’t, you’ll probably miss the point of discipline altogether and more than likely hurt your child in ways you never intended. I’m not talking about losing control during a spanking or other form of discipline… though that would be cause for serious concern. I’m talking about hurting them on a deeper level, a soul level.

Child discipline is about more than:

  • correction of misguided actions
  • punishment for crimes (real or imagined)
  • rules that have to be kept
  • respect for authority
  • first-time obedience
  • or the like…

Under the surface, in every discipline situation and in all of life, your child is asking the following heart-level question of you, their parent:

Do you REALLY CARE about me?

Every human being lives in fear. We fear being rejected – of being unloved. We want and need to know that we are truly loved. Children are no different.

This is especially true when you need to discipline your child. They want to know (they NEED to know), that when they are at their very worst, you still care about THEM. Let’s think that through for a moment…

  • When your son is clearly in the wrong and punishment of some kind is entirely appropriate, he wants to know if you really care about him.
  • When your daughter made a bad mistake or foolish decision, she wants to know if you really care about her.
  • When they’ve brought home a bad grade on their report card, they want to know if you really care about them.
  • When he’s wrecked the car, he wants to know if you really care about him.

Think of it this way:

  • If you only focus on the rules (without understanding their heart) – you are communicating that rules are more important than the person you are dealing with (your child).
  • If you don’t take the time to understand what they were thinking and feeling that prompted them toward their decision, you are communicating that you don’t care about what they think and feel.
  • If you fixate on the damage they’ve done and not on what was going on inside them, you are communicating that the damage or loss is more important to you than they are.

If you do these kinds of things, you run the risk of embittering your children, of provoking them to anger. (Ephesians 6:4; Colossians 3:21) In fact, you probably will. Sadly, parents do this all the time and don’t realize it. Then they wonder why their 4 year old is stubborn and disobedient, or why their teenager is sullen and disrespectful. Could it be that the parent has not taken the time to add concern for their children to their discipline of their children?

Child discipline: a better approach

child discipline

photo: flickr by city of Murietta, GA

Even in situations where your child is clearly in the wrong, you can still communicate that you care about them first and foremost. How do you do that?

1. Understand that it takes work and time – and be willing to put in the effort. You’ll have to ask questions, discover motives, listen to reasoning, and help them dissect it all with godly maturity and discernment. Making that effort communicates your deep concern for them.

2. Develop a desire to truly understand their heart, even when they’ve willfully done wrong. Your children will more readily accept your correction when they know it’s coming from a parent who desires to understand them.

3. Communicate God’s love for them in spite of their sin, as you demonstrate God’s love as their parent. Your children need to know, especially in a disciplinary situation that you (like God) still love them – warts, sin, rebellion, sassy mouth, disobedience – and all.

4. Respond with both compassion and justice. They need to know that you are upset at how their sin affects them (compassion), and that you care about them enough to help them overcome it through loving discipline (justice).

When you take the time to walk through these, and other caring steps, you will be shepherding their heart (there’s an excellent book by that title… I highly recommend it). You will be caring for the very core of who they are, which is exactly what they are wondering about.

What other steps would you add to this list?

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Categories : Parenting
Tags : care for your children, child discipline, Christian parenting, parenting advice, parenting help, parenting tips, shepherding a child's heart

Parenting magazine is anything BUT expert advice

Posted by Carey 
· Friday, August 31st, 2012 

Why would I say Parenting magazine is anything but expert advice? – It could be because of a recent article published in the magazine entitled “20 things Moms should never feel guilty about.” (and many others they publish along the same line)

The list starts out somewhat OK, but once it rolls past #10, it gets really, uhhhh, twisted… here are some examples:

You should never feel guilty about…

12. Telling your partner you’re going to the doctor for a checkup when you’re actually going for a massage, pedicure, or to have your hair highlighted (it’s not like he’s going to notice anyway).

13. Paying cash for your massage/pedicure/highlights so he won’t discover the credit card charge.

14. Refusing another mom’s invitation to a playdate because you can’t stand it that she can leave crystal on her coffee table and toilet paper on the rollers and her baby doesn’t bother any of it.

15. Feeling a twinge of delight when the above mom’s baby still isn’t saying any words and yours has a vocabulary of six!

16. Putting on the Baby Einstein DVD for the third time before lunch so you can apply some makeup because that cute landscaping guy is due to come by and cut your grass sometime this afternoon.

So let me get this straight…

This is a magazine that endeavors to help parents be better parents. Is that right? Yet it is encouraging parents to be the kind of people they would NEVER want their child to be.

My translation of the points above…

You should never feel guilty even though you…

12. Lie to your spouse so that you can go out and do what you want to do without him knowing.

13. Practice deception to cover up your lie.

14. Be unsociable toward someone of whom you are jealous so that you don’t have to face your jealousy.

15. Take delight in the developmental delays of a BABY because of your own jealousy toward the baby’s mother.

16. Indulge in lust and fantasy… even though you have a baby lying in the next room.

See what I mean?

Parenting magazine is anything but expert advice because it misses one of THE fundamentals of good parenting… the power and importance of a good example. That is what parents are first and foremost.

 

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Categories : Parenting
Tags : bad parenting, Christian family, Christian home, Christian marriage, Christian parenting, godly parenting, parenting, parenting advice, parenting counsel, parenting help, parenting magazine, parenting tips
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