How many times have we looked at our children and thought this. "I have raised you the best way that I know how but you act this way anyway?" You do not have to be a Christian parent to have that thought. My wife and I have been married now for 18 years and for several of those years we home schooled our children. Due to the scope of this short article I can not go into the many reasons why we would not want our children in a public school. What I can say is that our decision to home school included the desire for our children to get a good education minus the garbage that children in public schools are exposed to. I will write a book on that later.
We are encouraged by the word of God in Proverbs 22:6 Train up a child in the way he should go, even when he is old he will not depart from it. Does that mean if you train them according to the word of God in the way that they are to live that they wont make mistakes or sometimes disappoint us? Of course not, our children will drive us crazy sometimes because of their choices which are either made out of rebellion, ignorance or peer pressure.
I have four children. My oldest son Jeremy is 21 and lives in Ohio. My oldest daughter Jessica went to be with the Lord when she was 10 years old. Had she lived she would be 17. Kristina who is now 16 and Justin who is now 13 both live with their mom and I. I love my children with all my being but I have to say that there is nothing more challenging than raising a teenage daughter. My princess loves me in her own way but sometimes it is not very easy to communicate with her in such a way that fosters peace in our home.
As I have learned how to be a father I am reminded many times of my relationship with my heavenly father. God loves me unconditionally and gives me the grace that I need for living each day. On many occasions I can see how it is necessary for me to emulate grace , mercy, longsuffering, meekness, gentleness, patience with my children no matter what it is they have done. I know that because I am reminded of how often my father in heaven has done the same thing with me. How many times have I made stupid decisions or rebelled against his word knowing full well that I was not doing the right thing? Did my heavenly father reach down from heaven and scream at me or lose his temper with me and severly punish me? At times he has had to chastise me and set me back on the straight and narrow but once the discipline was over I always knew that he loved me and that his plan for my life is perfect.
My desire has always been to break the generational curse that I grew up under. My parents raised me the way they did because their parents and grand parents raised them that way. Some of what they did was good and I benefited from it greatly. However there were some things that they did that I would not dare to do with my children today. My parents took us out of an orphanage in Aschofenburg Germany when we were 1 and 2 years old. They provided for us the medical benefits that we did not have in that orphanage. On the other hand there was not a lot of love and encouragement when we needed it the most.
Hopefully my words have stirred up your heart as a parent and you will take the time to share your stories with the rest of us. God bless
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Parenting