Family

May 2007 | Posted in • Family | (0) Comments |

The other day my daughter Vanessa was telling me a story about our 2½-year-old granddaughter, Rivers.  Vanessa was in her kitchen, preparing a dish to bring to a family gathering of ours. As she was feeling the rush to get done, she heard this gentle, sweet voice from the living room say, “Mommy, Jesus is my friend.“  Is there anything more precious than a child speaking the words of God?  What had been put into Rivers came back out. 

When we hear our children say things, we often do a Joe McGee impersonation, “Where did that come from? Who taught you to say that?“ If we will take time to evaluate our comings and goings, we may be surprised at what we have put inside our children.  Many times we do not realize how much what we do or say influences them, until the appointed season of time that it is revealed. 

“‘This is My covenant with them, My Spirit who is upon you, and My words which I have put in your mouth, shall not depart from your mouth, nor from the mouth of your descendants’ descendants,‘ says the Lord, ‘from this time and forevermore.‘“
- Isaiah 59:21

I remember a time over eleven years ago, when my two youngest children, Dave and Elizabeth, were 4 and 5 years old.  During that season, I had been spending every opportunity possible in my closet praying, often late into the night when everyone was asleep.  At times during the day, if there was someone available to spend time with them, I would pray. 

One day, after this had been going on for quite a while, my 19-year old, Vanessa, came to me and said, “Mom, Elizabeth has been going and sitting outside your door when you pray. She asked me what were you doing, and I told her, ‘praying in tongues.‘ Elizabeth wants to know how to pray in tongues like you. You may want to talk with her.“ 

I had been given the opportunity to put inside of my 5-year-old daughter what was inside me.  Parents, we never know when our children are watching us.   I was surprised, excited, and apprehensive. My 5-year-old daughter wanted to experience the Baptism of the Holy Spirit!

Earlier that year, by herself in her room, Elizabeth had accepted Jesus as her Savior. She then came downstairs and announced her decision to the family. Even so..was she old enough for this?  If Holy Spirit could draw her to sit by my closet door and listen to me pray, putting the desire inside of her, then she was ready to have her own prayer language.

However, Holy Spirit did give me wisdom to wait and not rush things, allowing Him to bring it about in His timing. The day came. We were riding in the car when, without warning, Elizabeth said, “I want to pray in tongues.“ My son David chimed in, “I do, too.“ I suggested that she wait until Sunday and let the Children’s Ministry Director at that time pray with her , but she would not hear of it. 

When we arrived home, I took her and David into the bedroom. We jumped up on my bed, and there we three sat, looking at each other. I have to be honest; as I looked at them, I was a little afraid.  “What if this doesn’t work? . They are so young,“ I thought.  But immediately the Word came: “God did not give us a spirit of fear”  So I began by explaining the what, when, why and how of the Baptism of the Holy Spirit.

David is outgoing and ready to jump in and make things happen. So, when we prayed, he immediately began to speak in tongues; in fact, he took off like a rocket praying, just like his personality. 

Elizabeth, however, is my deep thinker, slow to speak, but great in understanding the things of life.  She processes life differently than David, as she did with praying in tongues. She did not pray in tongues immediately.

I sent David out to play and proceeded to encourage Elizabeth.  “You believed, you asked, and you have received your prayer language. It’s inside of you, waiting to come out.“ She understood what I was saying and also went to play.

The next day, I was in the laundry room folding clothes.  Behind me, I heard her gentle voice saying, “I got it, I got it.“  As I turned around, I saw my Elizabeth with a radiant smile on her face.  In her bedroom, by herself with Holy Spirit, she began to pray in tongues, just as she had done with accepting Jesus as her Savior.  We were so excited!

I knew my Father God would take care of my little girl, that He would not disappoint her.  She believed, she asked, and God isn’t a liar.“did He not say, will He not do?“  Yes, He did!! 

God has given us parents a blank canvas in each of our children; we begin filling it the moment they are born. We create in their hearts what we have in our own hearts.  I encourage you to feed on the Word of God every day.  Ask God for guidance as a believer, as an adult, and as a parent.  It’s not easy being a parent, and none of us will do it right all the time.  But, if we have a heart after God, and as we are willing and obedient to His word, we will put good stuff into our children. And they in turn will with our grandchildren.  And on it goes

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"Parenting is no easy-bake cake," I was told as a child when I said I wanted five children. But at ten years old, I felt that I knew much more than I had been given credit for knowing. I already knew exactly how life would go. I knew that I would have three girls and two boys. My kids would be good kids. I would never have to yell at my kids, spank them, or ground them. I wouldn't need to tell my children "no" all the time. I would give them the freedom to make their own decisions because they would be smart enough to make good decisions. And if my children did have questions about life, I would explain out all the answers for them, and do it patiently. I would never say, "because I said so." I hated to hear that, and knew my kids would, too.

Fast forward a couple of decades. I am now thirty and have three boys, no girls. I do have good kids, but I don't think they got the memo about "being good all the time." I have yelled, spanked, and grounded them. I can honestly say that I have probably said "because I said so" more times in the last six years than my parents said in ten years. And, I firmly believe in the theory that "I don't owe you an explanation; do what I said because I am your mother." I cannot say that life is going quite the way I planned it long ago. I am also finding out that my parents knew a lot more about being a parent than I gave them credit for knowing.

I have learned a lot about my parents since I became a parent myself. I have learned that there are some things in life that you don't have to explain, that "no" isn't just to keep you from being happy, and that the world doesn't revolve around me. I have learned that good kids can make bad decisions, and that the consequences are sometimes hard to pay. I have also learned that trust is a great avenue between honor and obedience.

My parents knew what every new parent, including myself, quickly finds out as they begin to train their young ones: "Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child…" (Prov. 22:15). Children have an inherited sin nature that, if left unbridled, will bring destruction to the child and to the family. Parents are to "Train up a child in the way he should go, so that when he is old he will not depart from it." (Prov. 22:6)

I have witnessed my own children, in their first few years of training, having to face the consequences of foolish decisions. "No," I would tell my young toddler as he started to do something he shouldn't. He would laugh and do the very thing that I had just told him not to do. He may have been too young to understand why I said "no," but he was old enough to know that I meant to immediately stop whatever he was doing when I said it. Yet he continued, until I backed up my words with what Proverbs says, " ... the rod of correction will drive it (foolishness) far from him."

"We are to train our children to serve God by serving Him ourselves, and by demonstrating servanthood to our children."

The Bible tells us that children are to "Honor your father and your mother." (Ex. 20:12) This scripture is repeated several times in both the Old and New Testaments. It is not a suggestion, but a commandment in the Word of God.

We are to teach our children to honor us in word, action, and attitude. The word "honor" literally means to "hold in high esteem, pay respect to a superior," or "lift up in praise and emulation." It is our responsibility as parents to teach our young children that in order to honor us, they must learn to obey us. We are the first authority that our children will ever know. We are to train our children to serve God by serving Him ourselves, and by demonstrating servant hood to our children. We are to represent the image of God well to our children. When we carry out our responsibilities as parents, using the Word of God as our guideline, our children will trust our authority, too.

April 2007 | Posted in • Family | (0) Comments |

“Before becoming a mother I had a hundred theories on how to bring up children.  Now I have seven children and only one theory:  love them, especially when they least deserve to be loved.“
- Kate Samperi

Before any of us actually live through parenting, we believe we have “in theory” what it takes to parent our children.  We read all the Christian parenting books and go to parenting seminars.  We seek out wisdom from those who blazed the trail before us.  We are ready; then our sweet, could do no wrong toddler decides to bite the nose of another toddler, drawing blood in the church nursery.  Do we need to go any further with this story!? 

This was a true story of my second child, who is now 28 years old and happily married.  What is now humorous to talk about was anything but humorous when it was happening.  It’s hard to find humor when things are difficult and you are walking it out.
Throughout the years of my life when I would experience difficulty, be it my fault, the devil’s fault, or no one’s fault, I found comfort in Psalm 30:5 which talks about there is weeping in the night. . .but the joy comes in the morning.  Sometimes your morning may take a while. . .. . .hang in there!  My morning took 17 years to come, and did not come as I would have imagined. 

Through my experiences as a parent, I have become a firm believer that we do the best we can with what we know. There are no dress rehearsals; it’s live as you go, mistakes and all.  Many years into parenting, I knew something was wrong, and that things were not as I had imagined they would be. I had trained my children to respond to my reactions to them.  And I was reacting to my children through the struggles deep inside of me.  Lifelong hurts and pains from my childhood were dictating how I parented my children. The generational cycles of my parents and their parents and so forth were being passed down to my children through me. 

We have been blessed to have four great children. Our oldest son who is “a little” like me, presented us with challenges at times. 
Our oldest daughter never did anything to get in trouble. Years later, she shared she was afraid. . . until Valentine’s Day 1995!  It was a Sunday lunch after the family had returned from church service.  We were at the table, and our daughter ‘reacted’ to something I was saying. I was thinking, “How dare she do that to me, her mom!“ I pushed my chair away from the table and started toward my daughter.  My godly husband and head of the house took control of the situation for me.  He stepped in, and with his authority, said these words, “You need to go to your room now!“ as he looked at me!  That was the day God got my attention through my husband.  God showed me what the problem was. . . it was me.

I needed help. I scheduled my first meeting with Pastor Mitch. In the following months, I spent hours praying and reading the Word, allowing God to change me.  God said to me that if I would allow Him to change me, then those changes would affect my children, my home life, everything. 

As time went on, God exposed layers of hurts, offenses, and wrong thinking about who I was through a class called Breaking the Cycle of Hurtful Family Experiences.  During this class, God revealed to me different times that I had hurt and offended my children by what I did or said. After praying late one night, I can remember going to my son’s bedroom, waking him up, and weeping as I repented. It was such a surprise to him that I would repent to him that he began to cry, too! 

God healed my relationship with both my children. And God was right. . ..if I trusted Him to change me, it would change my children.

I want to encourage every parent reading this article, that if you are struggling as a parent, seek help. Needing help doesn’t make you a bad parent! We all need help from time to time in life. Our church offers great small groups classes, or you can make an appointment with Frann Sarpolus for personal ministry. 

God loves you and wants to create a home where both you and your children enjoy living. Our Father God loves us and forgives us unconditionally . . .it is important as parents that we are able to give the same to our children. . .“and only one theory: love them, especially when they least deserve to be loved. . .“

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The Word of God says that “children are a heritage of the Lord, The fruit of the womb is a reward (Psalm 127: 3).“  Webster defines the word heritage as “property that descends to an heir.“  We are the heirs of God Almighty, and our children belong to Him. When we consider that children are a heritage, a gift from our Father in Heaven, we know that we should take care of the gift that has been given.  Each child has within them the very spirit that God created them to be from infancy to adulthood.  He has plans for each of our children, to give them a hope and a future (Jer. 29:11).  We are to nurture and cultivate their hearts toward the plan of God for their lives.  Here are a just a few ways to invest into the plan that God has for our children:

First, we should pray for our children daily. We should pray with our understanding and include in our prayers such topics as our child’s salvation (Rom. 10: 9-13), their heart’s desires to be in line with God’s plan and purpose for them (Prov. 16:9), that they “may prosper in all things and be in health” (3 John 2), and that the enemy’s plans and weapons will fail to prosper against them (Is. 54:17).  We should also pray with other tongues, and allow ourselves to be used by the Holy Spirit to pray the perfect will of God for our children.  This method of prayer is especially helpful when our children are facing challenges and we are unsure how to help them overcome.

The second area of investment in our children is our witness.  This is how we lives our life in front of them daily.  We cannot expect our children to live up to a standard that we ourselves do not meet.  They emulate what they see before them.  The Bible speaks very clearly that we are commanded to live right before God, and that we are to teach the same to our children.  We are to diligently teach them by the way we talk and act in our homes, and the way we “walk our walk,“ both in the morning, and in the evening. (Deut. 6:6-9 & Deut. 11:18-20)  This means we cannot put on a “church” show for our children on Sunday morning, and not live it out Monday through Saturday when life’s pressures come upon us. 

“We cannot expect our children to live up to a standard that we ourselves do not live.“

Another area of investment that we should pour into our children is how important church and discipleship is to their spiritual growth. When the church is having a service, we should be there with our children.  After church, we should also talk with our children about what they learned from the service (or their class), and share with them what we gained from the service as well. Taking the extra time to discuss a lesson more thoroughly may help bring added understanding to our children and help them grow spiritually.  Find ways to reinforce the lesson throughout the week to demonstrate the practicality of God’s Word.  In addition to church attendance and lesson discovery, as a family, spend time praying, reading God’s Word, and learning scriptures.  These are powerful opportunities to demonstrate the importance of a relationship with God to our children.

In conclusion, we should be real with our children on their level of understanding.  Seek the Lord’s guidance on how to use biblical principles to invest in your child’s discovery and growth in God.  Remember that it is the “Lord (that) builds the house” (Ps. 127:1), and we as parents need His direction and counsel to make wise investments into our children, investments that will bear good fruit for a lifetime.