12.19.2005
Wanted: Humility
While eating dinner with Richard and his family the other week, my wife asked his wife what they did to have such well-behaved children (a good habit to get into when ever you see such children). His wife replied that they just asked their children for forgiveness all the time.
Being a parent is a great way to begin to understand the idea of authority. It's so easy to use our God given authority to "lord it over" our children. But it's often more effective to humble ourselves, and admit that we don't have this parenting thing down. Sometimes we need to entreat our children's forgiveness and explain how we also need Jesus' help in raising them. This been something that we were blessed to learn early on in our parenting, but I think that we are too quick to forget the lesson. It's easy to be tempted to "lay down the law" and sometimes that is necessary, but I need to remember to be a humble father in front of my children, as one who answers to a higher authority.
While eating dinner with Richard and his family the other week, my wife asked his wife what they did to have such well-behaved children (a good habit to get into when ever you see such children). His wife replied that they just asked their children for forgiveness all the time.
Being a parent is a great way to begin to understand the idea of authority. It's so easy to use our God given authority to "lord it over" our children. But it's often more effective to humble ourselves, and admit that we don't have this parenting thing down. Sometimes we need to entreat our children's forgiveness and explain how we also need Jesus' help in raising them. This been something that we were blessed to learn early on in our parenting, but I think that we are too quick to forget the lesson. It's easy to be tempted to "lay down the law" and sometimes that is necessary, but I need to remember to be a humble father in front of my children, as one who answers to a higher authority.
