Due to my love for music, I want my kids to know its inherent beauty beyond their ability simply to hear notes. So with no hidden dreams of creating prodigies, my husband and I have invested our finances, time, and oversight into making music a priority. We’ve given our kids certain choices along the way, but we understand that we all have a part to play. Their part is to practice; ours is to teach them how to follow through with their commitment and to help them to invest their talents appropriately. If we want our kids to value something, we’ve learned that we must be willing to pay a price.
The same applies to our children’s spiritual growth. While taking our kids to church is valuable and necessary, our investment in their spiritual growth shouldn’t begin and end with a Sunday service. As parents, our commitment to Christ should permeate every part of our lives, so that:
His Word shapes our every decision (Deuteronomy 6:6,8-9,17). Our children (who know us behind closed doors) see and respond to it (Deuteronomy 6:20). We value it as an inheritance to be guarded and given.
Setting aside devotional time is a great response to God’s commandment to teach our children. However, if we believe He can fulfill His promise to put His Word “on the lips of [our] children and [our] children’s children forever” (Isaiah 59:21), we must also understand that we can’t just convey God’s commandments in structured teaching settings. We need to live them out in God-given spontaneous moments as well.
If we believe our children need structure and investment when it comes to their athletic, artistic, scholastic, or musical pursuits, how much more so should we make provision for them to flourish spiritually! Let’s consistently live out and teach our kids what God has revealed.
NLT 365-day reading plan passage for today: Deuteronomy 31:1-8
More:
Read Joshua 4 to see the importance of testifying to our children of the Lord’s goodness and faithfulness.
Next:
Why do we find that it’s easier to invest more time and effort into temporary things for our children’s lives than it is to invest in eternal ones? How are you passing on the truths of Jesus to the next generation?
Joe Hill on February 25, 2012 at 6:06 am
Thank you so much for today’s devotional, it really touched my heart. I make a living driving a truck, music is my passion! It’s hard to do, but my greatest joy is to write music and use verses from Psalms for the lyrics. I hope King David likes what I do and he also commends you for the importance of music that you have emphasized to your children.
regina franklin on February 25, 2012 at 10:13 pm
Dear Joe,
May the Lord continue to keep you safe on the road and may He use your life as a powerful song of worship heard/seen by those you encounter on your journeys.
daisymarygoldr on February 29, 2012 at 5:35 pm
Investing in academics, athletics, art and music to provide our children with a well-rounded education is important. Yet, all these things are a waste if children do not grow in the grace and knowledge Jesus Christ. Temporary achievements will not last. And if they have missed God, they have missed everything.
We know God through His Word. Young Timothy’s mother taught him the Scriptures from childhood, which gave him the wisdom to receive the salvation that comes by trusting in Christ Jesus. Children are most impressionable at their youngest age and this is when the seed of God’s word gets deeply planted in their hearts. We must not wait till they grow and develop their own views influenced by worldly wisdom gained from secular books, movies, music, and TV.
It is important to reinforce our teaching from our experience and by our example. God should be their first love. This is my own personal experience. And the other day, my heart leaped with joy to hear my daughter say Jesus Christ is her first love. To invest in their eternal future we must teach our children to pursue Christ.
Spencer Courtis on April 30, 2012 at 3:20 am
I have often heard parents, far to often say that we should not ‘force’ our children to attend fellowship (church), that we should leave that up to them.
I have replied that i ‘force’ my children to attend secular school both in the snow of winter and the warmth of summer, that i certainly will not leave that decision up to them, least of all their spiritual well-being at ‘Sunday’ school.
regina franklin on April 30, 2012 at 8:09 am
Dear Spencer,
A resounding “amen” from this corner. Sadly, we spend more time making sure our kids make it to every little league practice and game than we do raising them in the things of the Lord. Church attendance does not bring salvation, but if I don’t teach my children certain disciplines like cleaning their rooms or brushing their teeth, they will find it much more difficult to incorporate these behaviors into their daily lives.
regina franklin on February 25, 2012 at 10:11 pm
Dear Chileshe,
What a beautiful testimony to your mom’s investment in your life. You’ve identified a very real issue with the internet. Last weekend, I spent time talking to a group of women, many of them moms and grandmothers, about the call on their lives to “be aware, be engaged and be of good courage” when it comes to investing in the lives of their children and grandchildren.
Many parents fall into the trap of thinking that their ability to text /facebook their children at any time day or night means they have influence over and knowledge of their children’s lives at any given moment. Sadly, we can often be “asleep” at the wheel while thinking the whole time that we are wide awake.