Parenting "Tips" for MOMS (and dads)

A few weeks ago, it was my joy to speak to the MOMS group at our church. After a brief devotional, I shared with them this list of parenting tips from our experience and aspirations. Although I know my wife's list would overlap this list, hers would have its own unique contribution. And of course, there are more 'tips' than these. These are merely the ones that seemed most pressing to hold out to the mothers at the meeting.

1. Be settled in Christ’s love; secure your identity and significance in him. Do not 'suck' your identity or worth from your child’s behavior, accomplishments or failures (1 Pet. 2:9-10).
2. Trust God for the outcome of your parenting and remember, your labor in the Lord is never in vain (1 Cor. 15:58).
3. Be an authentic witness of the living Christ, not just a person who does the activity of bearing “witness” (Acts 1:8).
4. Model the difference between knowing about God and knowing him (cf.  Eph. 3:14-19).
5. Do not be fooled by the distinction between your child confessing your beliefs as his and confessing his own faith (cf. John 10:3)
6. Kill legalism as a ground for your child’s relationship to you and GOD (cf. Eph. 2:8-9).
7. If you are married, repetitively demonstrate to your child that you love your spouse (Eph. 5:22-33).
8. Do not be surprised that your child is a sinner, and be ready to offer correction and model the gospel in your relationship with them, i.e., forbearance, forgiveness and reconciliation (Rom. 3:23; Ephesians 4:32-5:1).
9. Speak aloud your hope in the promises of the gospel and echo that hope in your verbal communication as a parent to your child. Speak phrases such as these to your child: “I am for you and not against you” and “You are mine.”
10. Model and teach the difference between the obedience of duty and the obedience of faith (Luke 15:11ff).
11. Teach your children to love, not merely because they ought, but intentionally remind them that Jesus says, “It is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35).
12. Tell your children that you pray for them, but avoid doing so as a lecture, scolding, discipline (Eph. 3:14-21).
13. Teach your children the value of the church, the value of gathering together with other believers. Guard your tongue  from grumbling against the church because it may rightly be interpreted as a grumbling against GOD (Heb. 10:25; 1 Pet. 4:9)
14. Embrace suffering as part of your calling as a parent (cf. John 15:12-13).
15. Be thankful and thereby encourage thankfulness to GOD at all times.
16. Live your family life ultimately, not for the glory of self, nor the glory of family, nor glory of anything but for the glory of GOD (1 Cor. 10:31; Gal. 6:14).

"God is able to make all grace abound to you..."

My reflections below on 2 Corinthians 9:8 were posted this week on the Fighter Verse blog: "To Strengthen Your Faith and Increase Your Love." Here is the link: http://is.gd/nYRALI

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"And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work. 

(2 Corinthians 9:8, ESV)

Often one of the things that keeps us from loving others is that we doubt God’s ability and inclination to care for us. In unbelief, we think, “If we are generous toward others, nobody will provide for our own needs.”

This verse, by the power of the Spirit, is given to you to strengthen your hope in God and increase your love for others. Just reflect on the implications of the words “all” and “every”in this verse.

First, notice that God is powerful to make “all grace” abound to you. God is not poor in his grace toward us, but being rich in grace he is able to give us grace overflowing.

Second, out of the fullness of his grace, God will provide us with “all sufficiency.” In other words, since God is rich in grace, you ought to be confident that he will care for you. Since, Christ died for you, you know that God will graciously give you all that you need (cf. Romans 8:32).

Third, this enablement from God is not just occasional but “at all times.” Even at times when you have little resources, God can be relied upon to provide what you need.

And finally, note the “every.” God’s purpose in all this enabling grace to you is that you may have excessive grace that is overflowing in “every” good work of love for other people.

Christian Community is a gift of God's grace

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, more than any other, has reminded me over and over again that Christian community is a gift of God's grace. He writes:


"It is easily forgotten that the community of Christians is a gift of grace from the kingdom of God, a gift that can be taken from us any day—that the time still separating us from the most profound loneliness may be brief indeed. Therefore, let those who until now have had the privilege of living a Christian life together with other Christians praise God’s grace from the bottom of their hearts. Let them thank God on their knees and realize: it is grace, nothing but grace, that we are still permitted to live in the community of Christians today." [Dietrich Bonhoeffer from his book Life Together]

Recommended Resources on Idolatry

In my sermon, "Keep Yourselves from Idols, Part 3",  I recommended these resources for further study on idolatry or 'the idols of the heart'.

David Powlison’s article “Idols of the Heart and ‘Vanity Fair’.”
Tim Keller’s Counterfeit Gods. [Available at the Bethlehem Bookstore]
Elyse Fitzpatricks’s Idols of the Heart. [Available at the Bethlehem Bookstore]
The “How People Change” seminar at Bethlehem Baptist or class that is offered here.
Mark Driscoll’s messages on idolatry.

13 Questions to Identify Heart Idols

Last weekend, my sermon was entitled "Keep Yourselves From Idols: Part 2" from 1 John 5:20-21. The audio is available on the Bethlehem Baptist Church Sermon Archives website.

In the message, I posed 13 questions (or clusters of questions)  to aid our search and identification of false 'gods' within our hearts. My intent was to identify areas within our hearts where we may have elevated created things or gifts from God to be ultimate and god-like.

I worded the questions myself, drawing from a sermon preached by the English Puritan pastor David Clarkson (1621-1686) entitled Soul Idolatry Excludes Men Out of Heaven  (The Works of David Clarkson, Vol II, The Banner of Truth Trust).

Several who heard the sermon have asked for the questions in order to use them personally or for  small
group discussion and interaction.

1. What do you most highly value?
2. By default, what do you think about?
3. What is your highest goal?
4. To what or whom are you most committed?
5. Who or what do you love the most?
6. Who or what do you trust the most?
7. Who or what do you fear the most?
8. Who or what do you hope in and hope for most?
9. Who or what do you desire the most? Or, what desire makes you most angry when you don’t get it
   satisfied? Or what desire makes you despair when you don’t get it satisfied?
10. Who or what do you most delight in— your greatest joy, treasure?
11. Who or what captures your greatest zeal?
12. To whom are you most thankful? Or what are you most thankful for?
13. For whom or what great purpose to you work?

Ask the Sprit of God to reveal areas where you may have turned God's gifts into 'gods'.  These idols will fail us, forsake us and lead us into misery and away from Christ. Then pray for God to enable you to value, love, trust, fear, hope in, desire, and delight in Him alone through Jesus Christ — not in any created thing— for your joy and his glory.