Encouraging - Justice

Children love justice and they’re very uneasy in a world of injustice and abuse. Therefore, when we teach children kindness and respect for others by insisting on civility in our classrooms and in our homes, we’re laying a foundation for human kindness in the world of adulthood to come. Sadly, the opposite philosophy is evident in many schools today. It needs to change. Don’t tell me that we as adults can’t put a stop to bullying. Of course we can. We know who the defenseless kids are. We can rescue them. We just need the determination to intervene when a child shows signs of distress. It is our profound obligation to get this job done.

Dr. James Dobson, Bringing Up Boys, (Tyndale, Carol Stream, IL: 2001), 48.

Encouraging - Parenting

Parents also need to “play offense” – to capitalize on the impressionable years of childhood by instilling in their sons the antecedents of character. Their assignment during two brief decades will be to transform their boys from immature and flighty youngsters into honest, caring men who will be respectful of women, loyal and faithful in marriage, keepers of commitments, strong and decisive leaders, good workers, and secure in their masculinity. And of course, the ultimate goal for people of faith is to give each child and understanding of Scripture and a lifelong passion for Jesus Christ. This is, I believe, the most important responsibility for those of us who have been entrusted with the care and nurturance of children.

Dr. James Dobson, Bringing Up Boys, (Tyndale, Carol Stream, IL: 2001), 6-7.

Encouraging - Children

My own love and desire for my kids’ love is so strong that it opened my eyes to how much God desires and loves us. My daughter’s expression of love for me and her desire to be with me is the most amazing thing. Nothing compares to being truly, exuberantly wanted by your children.

Through this experience, I came to understand that my desire for my children is only a faint echo of God’s great love for me and for every person He made. I am just an earthly, sinful father, and I love my kids so much it hurts. How could I not trust a heavenly, perfect Father who loves me indefinitely more than I will ever love my kids?

Francis Chan, Crazy Love (David C. Cook, Colorado Springs, CO: 2008), 55.

Encouraging - Father's Love

Note: My wife will be induced with our second child on Wednesday. Please pray everything goes well.

I recently started to read another one of Randy Alcorn’s books. Much like Heaven, If God is Good, is structured similarly with many short chapters similar to a reference book. The material is fairly heavy, so Alcorn laces the chapters with compelling stories to illustrate his points. In this chapter, he’s discussing natural disasters and how they bring out the best in people:

In 1988, an Armenian earthquake killed forty-five thousand. In the chaos, one man made his way to his son’s school, only to find nothing but rubble. Other parents stumbled around dazed and weeping, calling out their children’s names. But this father ran to the back corner of the building where his son’s classroom once was, and began digging.

To everyone else, it seemed hopeless. How could his son have survived? But this father had promised he would always be there for his boy, so he heaved rocks and dug, calling for his son by name: “Armand!”

Well-meaning parents and bystanders tried to pull him out of the rubble. “It’s too late!” “They’re dead!” “There’s nothing you can do!” The fire chief tried to pull him away saying, “Fires and explosions are happening everywhere. You’re in danger. Go home!” Finally, the police came and said, “You’re in shock. You’re endangering others. Go home. We’ll handle it!”

But the man continued to dig, hour after hour – eight hours, then twelve, twenty-four, thirty-six hours. Finally, in the thirty-eighth hour of digging – a day and a half after everyone told him to give up hope – he called his son’s name again, pulled back a big rock, and heard his son’s voice.

“Armand!” the father screamed. From under the rocks came the words, “Dad? I told them! I told the other kids that if you were still alive, you’d save me!”

The father helped his son and thirteen other children climb out of the rubble. When the building had collapsed, the children survived in a tentlike pocket. The father lovingly carried his son home to his mother. When the townspeople praised Armand’s father for saving the children, he simply explained, “I promised my son, ‘No matter what, I’ll be there for you!”

Randy Alcorn, If God Is Good: Faith in the Midst of Suffering and Evil (Multnomah, Colorado Springs, CO: 2009), 89-90.

* Disclaimer - Since creating this blog, I have always added a hyperlink on Amazon for you to read a full description of the books I've excerpted. Initially, I tried adding an image as well so that you could see the book, but it wasn't appearing on the emails, so I removed it. They have made many improvements to blogger, so I am testing it out once again. I created my Amazon Associates account primarily for my link on my website, but if you click on the image or hyperlink it acts as a portal through my account. Thus, a small percentage of anything you purchase once on Amazon will be attributed to my account.   

Encouraging - Hope

To hope for our children is not to bind them to our dreams for their success, fame, safety, or even happiness. Neither is hope the futile effort to redeem our own past by seeing our children do better than we have done. To dream for our children is to lean into the quiet cries of the Holy Spirit that call out the true, God-given name of our child. If we refuse to quit dreaming, we may one day hear this name. We must have the hope to imagine, and the imagination to dream, the reality of God for our children.

Dan B. Allender, How Children Raise Parents: The Art of Listening to Your Family (Waterbrook Press, Colorado Springs, CO: 2003), 147.

Encouraging - Uniqueness

“Teach your children to choose the right path, and when they are older, they will remain upon it” (Proverbs 22:6).

The proverb invites us to teach our children according to each one’s unique “bent,” their natural inclination and learning style. And if we work in concert with our children’s uniqueness, they won’t depart from their God-given bent even as they age. If we were working with wood to fashion a bow for hunting, we would bend the wood in the way it is formed rather than to try to refashion it by bending it in the opposite direction. The wisdom of Proverbs 22:6 is to find and follow our child’s natural bent. This is not a guarantee of success, but a practical guideline that leads to parenting well.

Dan B. Allender, How Children Raise Parents: The Art of Listening to Your Family (Waterbrook Press, Colorado Springs, CO: 2003), 31.

Encouraging - Uniqueness

Every child is unique, and every child must find the ways she can fit in the world and the manner in which she is not to be of the world. A child who is too hesitant to buck the world’s system must be called to test the boundaries of convention in order to obey God. On the other hand, a child who can’t seem to conform to any rule must find how to be sufficiently “in” a larger world to engage it with her Christian perspective. Each child will have a bent in one of these directions: either to be “of” the world by conforming too closely to its values or to be “not of” this world and to stand completely apart from it. It is our task to affirm and then challenge the bent. If our child is either a rebel or a rule keeper, it is both good and not good. The good must be grown, and the not-good must meet the strength of parental resistance. The dilemma is that we seldom see good in being a rebel, and we fail to see ill in being a rule keeper. We must work both sides of the aisle to accomplish God’s purpose in developing a tender and strong heart in a child. We must grow a child’s ability to fit the world and also to resist the world.

Dan B. Allender, How Children Raise Parents (Waterbrook Press, Colorado Springs, CO: 2003), 41-42.