Your View of Parenting: Godly or Worldly?
Photo credit: Tom Cuppens via photopin cc
A few weeks ago, our neck of the woods in New Zealand was blessed with so much rain, that it flooded many parts of our area. Schools were temporarily closed down, people were trapped in their homes, and the most devastating of all, my sons’ soccer practice was cancelled :P. Disappointment on faces of little boys is heart-breaking.
A mass email was promptly sent out by our sons’ respective soccer coaches notifying the inevitable. It was one of those emails, though, that jolted me into the reality of how many parents view their children today. This is what I read:
“Hope you are all staying dry and I think we will all be happy if the schools will be open tomorrow!!”
My Humble Confession
I am ashamed to say that I used to be one of those parents. When my children were attending public school, I was one of those moms who couldn’t wait to send their children off to school in the morning, and was dreading them coming home in the afternoon. My children were a burden to me. An obstacle preventing me from accomplishing what I wanted to do. Hindrances to my self-seeking desires and dreams.
Oh, I loved them alright. Deeply! But I didn’t have God’s heart for them, and sacrificing my own selfish existence was not something I had even considered.
It’s a long story, but one day, God turned my entire world around. I was literally forced into a situation where I had to homeschool my little ones. And the Lord led me step by surprising step in changing my heart, vision, and outlook on who these dear ones that He had entrusted to me are.
The way the world views children is completely opposed to what Scripture says, yet often, even as a believer, you can fall into the trap, culture reaches into your home, and your family is compromised. <–Click to Tweet
Learning from the Bible
In the book of Joel 3:3, the prophet gives an account of some disturbing times. He says:
“… and [they] have traded a boy for a prostitute,
and have sold a girl for wine, and have drunk it.”
The context is that the Jews were reduced to wretched circumstances in their captivity, and their children were sold by their oppressors; the children were often bartered for both necessaties and luxuries of life.
Notice that little girls and boys (under the age of 17) were being traded and sold in exchange for pleasure and sin.
It is clear that children were valueless in the days of Joel, and this verse highlights the greed and immorality of the adults. They saw no worth in the lives of young ones.
They didn’t adhere to the sound Word of the Lord in Psalm 127:3 which so beautifully states, “Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward.”
They failed to “See that you do not despise one of these little ones. For I tell you that in heaven their angels always see the face of my Father who is in heaven,” as Matthew 18:10 so lovingly expresses.
And alas, my dear friend, has our society not fallen to the deep pit of viewing children as worthless nuisances, valueless hindrances, humans to set aside in pursuit of our own pleasures? <–Click to Tweet
Your View of Parenting: Godly or Worldly?
You and I need to be so aware, and ask the Lord to keep our hearts pure from the futile thinking of those who do not know God.
Do not conform to the pattern of this world,
but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is
—his good, pleasing and perfect will.
Romans 12:1
You are called to view children as a blessing, a heritage, a ministry unto our Great God. How our young ones thrive in an atmosphere of love, acceptance and value!
Make it your goal, my sweet sister, by God’s grace, to be transformed into the Lord’s way of thinking, and keep yourself from being polluted by the world (James 1:27) in your thoughts and attitudes. May He help us all!
So, dear Mr. Soccer Coach, I would like to hope that all parents would be happy if the schools stayed closed for another day, so that parents would have the chance to spend more quality time loving and valuing their precious children!
Is your view of parenting Godly or worldly? Have you fallen prey to any ways that have subtly made their way from the world into your mind?
