Successful Parenting

 

“Training a child to follow Christ is easy for parents.

All they have to do is lead the way.”

  Parenting Magazine recently released a list of the best parenting books of  2021. While I haven’t read any of them, they sound very familiar with the popular parenting philosophy of the last 50 years.
  My favorite title was How To Talk So Little Kids Will Listen. The authors promise, “This international bestseller will make you calm listeners and see things from your children’s perspectives so that you can communicate with them better.” Personally, I think they’re over-promising. Another was The Whole-Brain Child, “This book lets you understand the reason behind every tantrum of your toddler. If you want to know why are those little monsters throwing a fit at every little thing, you must know how their brain works at that time.” I laughed when I read that and thought, I wonder if there’s an adult version. But none of the “experts” have all of the answers. Often when you see the end product of their own parenting, they raised a Frankenstein. Here’s the truth about parenting from a biblical worldview.
  You’re a parenting failure and were raised by parenting failures. According to Scripture, we’re all sinners (Romans 3:23). The best place to begin a forward path in parenting is to suspect your own sinful heart. The reason some childish behaviors so annoy you is that they reveal sin in your own soul. It’s not the child that first has a problem, it’s you.
  With that our greatest parental blunders are learned from our own parents. We not only pass down our DNA, but we also pass down our sinful patterns. For example, Abraham was the father of the faithful but was a habitual liar (denying your wife is your wife is a big one). Isaac steps right in Dad’s shoes as he lies. Jacob takes lying up to a few notches. His sons are professional liars. They lied that their brother was killed by wild animals when they’d sold him into slavery. Then, they watch their father break down into inconsolable grief.
  Look for sinful patterns in your own parenting. Have a godly friend be graciously honest with you to help. By God’s grace, make your generation the last one with that sinful pattern. You won’t be able to do it alone. It’s why you need help from God and godly friends.
  You have a loving, all-sufficient God who will supply all of your needs, including parental ones. To succeed, we must get your priorities in order. The best parenting book is the Bible. Yet, it’s noteworthy that the Bible says little about parenting but says a lot about who we are and who we’re supposed to be. It’s not our child who needs to first change, we do. We need God’s wisdom and grace because we’re naturally selfish. We must let God’s love flow on us and then through us to our child. Many times what we consider parental love is really self-love. We want our child to behave because it benefits us not them. God’s Word is a mirror that reveals that.
  Parenting is more about God molding you than you molding your children. God is creating a masterpiece – YOU. When a sculptor is chipping away at a piece of marble, I wonder what the marble would say if it could talk? God uses our children to chip away at our sinful hearts.
  First, a child helps us grow past self-love to loving them. Being a parent is the closest we will ever get to modeling God’s unconditional love. We love our children from their first breath when they can return none of that love. In fact, they do many things that should cause us to not love them from screaming when they’re hungry, to spitting up or messing their diapers.
  Then, a child teaches us joy. We’re thrilled with that little grin even if may be gas. Every little step of maturity raises us to ecstasy from rolling over to those first steps and words.
  A child helps us grow in peace. We tend to move at a frenetic pace. Rocking a child to sleep slows us down. We learn to be quiet and move slowly. We become more gentle so we don’t disturb or frighten them.  Seeking to parent our children in a way that’s best for them cultivates the fruit of the Spirit in us.
  Our children teach us to trust more and pray more. If you ever have the opportunity to visit Children’s Hospital, do it. Not only have I visited many patients there, but when our son, Ben, was a child he was hospitalized with epilepsy (he’s since had brain surgery and is seizure-free). Visiting there brings home very powerfully that even the best, most fastidious parent can’t protect their child 24/7. Children are there who are victims of freak accidents. Even the most germaphobe parent can’t protect their child from cancer or leukemia or a malfunctioning heart. Even the F.B.I. (Family Bureau of Investigation) can’t protect a child from the wrong friends, being introduced to drugs or pornography, or even being molested. Most importantly, you can’t protect your child spiritually. They’re born with a sin nature just like their parents. Even with frequent exposure to biblical truth, they will one day have to choose to follow the Lord for themselves. God’s Word tells us that our children are a gift from God (Ps. 127:3). He’s the only One who can protect them and work in their heart. Of all the things that your child needs, one of the greatest gifts you can give them is to pray for them and give them back to the Giver.
  Train a child according to God’s design. One of the most misinterpreted verses in Scripture related to parenting is Proverbs 22:6, “Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.” It doesn’t mean if you invest in a child spiritually, they always return to it. What it means is that you must study your child, know their bent,  temperament, gifts, and abilities and then direct them in the way that God has designed them. Each of us has unique fingerprints and DNA. Our Creator is not in the mass production business. Wise parents don’t attempt to force square children into round holes or to live out the parents’ dreams.
  Follow the example of the only perfect parent – God. If you want to be a successful parent, know your Heavenly Father. As you know the Father, follow His example in how He parents us as His children. God is our best example of love, leadership, and correction. He’s our model of patience and wisdom. He’s the One that teaches us about true success – eternal success.
  Sure, it might be great if your adult child had a college degree or was a successful entrepreneur BUT if they don’t know Jesus as their Savior and live for Him…what does it matter. Do you want to be a successful parent? Love God, live for Him and teach and model that for them.
  I’m sure that some of the latest parenting books have some valid suggestions. The Book that you need to be a successful parent is from the Father who truly does know best, always has, and always will! 

Can we help you spiritually? Can we help you know Jesus better? Please check out more resources on our church's web page, Gracechurchwi.org. Or, call us at 262.763.3021. If you'd like to know more about how Jesus can change your life, I'd love to mail you a copy of how Jesus changed my life in "My Story." E-mail me at Carson@gracechurchwi.org to request a free copy. Please include your mailing address. 

Priorities

 “You define what’s important by what you dedicate your time to.”

 
Have you ever come across people who clearly have misplaced priorities? We can look at them and realize what they care about is completely out of whack. One such example is that of Marcin Muchalski. Marcin was a tough New Yorker (you gotta give him that much). He was approached by a thief at gunpoint while walking across the Williamsburg Bridge.
  What did the robber want? His cell phone. His Nokia 3390 to be exact. And no, I am not making this up…Mr. Muchalski preferred to risk parting with his life than with his phone. He surmised that the armed bandit would be too timid to shoot him in public at 7:00 a.m. on the bridge, obviously not putting together that this guy was already willing to pull a gun on him, so he dared the guy to shoot him over a phone.
  His assailant found the request reasonable and readily complied, shooting Muchalski in the thigh. Maybe that was the moment when Muchalski realized his assailant was also a tough New Yorker. Did he then hand over the phone? Nope. He hobbled away, clutching his phone as he went, presumably because it came with that Snake game. The gunman fled the scene but was later caught when Muchalski used his phone to call the cops.
  All of us struggle with priorities. While they’ve always been difficult, with the increased choices and options of our culture, evaluating and determining priorities is even more convoluted.
  E.M. Gray spent his life searching for the one denominator that all successful people share. He found it wasn’t hard work, good luck, or astute human relations, though those were all important. The one factor that seemed to transcend all the rest … [was] putting first things first.
  Along the same lines, German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe grasped the importance of priorities. He observed, “Things which matter most must never be at the mercy of things which matter least.”
  Setting the right priorities are vital for success, but not just for material success. The Bible sets priorities that lead to eternal life and spiritual success. It’s insignificant to be successful in this short life but a failure for the next. God’s Word tells us that it’s vital to put our priorities in the right order and then carefully cultivate them with zeal and enthusiasm.
  What should our priorities be? Well, if this one is correct, it’s simpler to align other priorities but when it’s not, life is a jumbled mess.
  Christian priority No. 1: God must come first. When God gave the Decalogue at Mount Sinai, He thundered these words: “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before Me” (Ex. 20:2-3). God does not want us to place anything before Him. His desire is that we worship Him, love Him first and that He has first place in our lives.
  How do we demonstrate that God is first, that we truly love Him. When we put His teachings first. 1 John 5:3, “For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome.”
  The evidence that God is first is that we love Him and strive to keep His commandments. “He who says, ‘I know Him,’ and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But whoever keeps His word, truly the love of God is perfected in him” (1 John 2:4-5).
  We have to be honest with ourselves. Are we putting our relationship with God first, or allowing other aspects of our lives to come before the priority and worship of the one true God?
  Our priorities determine how we start our day. For some sleep is a priority and they continually hit the snooze button, squeezing every moment of slumber that they can. For others, coffee is a top priority. They don’t start the day without it or that stop by a favorite coffee shop. Our priorities direct and alter our lives.
  When God is first, we give Him the best. He’s not squeezed into the margins of our life. Amazingly and wonderfully, when God is first everything else: marriage, family, work, leisure, finances, friendships, mental health, etc. falls more easily into place. Our relationship with God must be our true north. When He’s not first, we find ourselves floundering, fighting and feeling frustrated through life.
  Back in the dark ages before the Internet and inexpensive cell phone calls, Jane and I had a long-distance romance. We wrote letters, lots of them. And when I got a letter from Jane, I’d read it and then I’d re-read it, and then I’d re-read it again. Think about this – the Creator of the universe, the God who knows everything about you, Who loves you and gave His Son for you, gave you a love letter – the Bible.
  But how can we think that God is our priority when we rarely if ever read His Word. The average American spends between 3 to 5 hours on their cell phone every day. Why? Our phones are a priority. If you don’t believe that just misplace yours and see how frantic you become. God and His Word must be like that. His Word becomes so much a part of our lives that it’s our normal. We want to hear from and talk to our Heavenly Father each day. Yet, it’s not enough to read or even study God’s Word, we must obey and apply Scripture to our lives.
  One Christian leader spent time in war-torn Angola and learned something from those rural villages that changed their walk with God and response to His Word. Their Angolan friend and guide told them, “One of the most frustrating things is that in villages where they received seed, they often eat the seed rather than planting it and bringing forth the harvest.”
  This is the reason why some Christians see the fruit of God’s Word in their lives and others don’t. For example, why have many of us read books on forgiving people, known the teachings were true and right, cried over them, marked them up with highlighters, yet remain in our bitterness? Because we ate the seed instead of sowing it.
  When God is our priority, His Word isn’t just information, it becomes our map for life. We read the Word of God. We hear it. Some even study it, but it has so little effect because we fail to apply it to our lives.
  If we want to reap a harvest of our full potential in Christ, then we must ask the Holy Spirit to make God’s Word work in our everyday circumstances. It’s not enough just to study the Word, we must apply it, too! We must, with God’s help, put it into practice and obey Him. As it says of these early believers in Acts 2, we must, with reverence and awe, “devote ourselves to the apostle’s teaching.”
  Are there other priorities? Absolutely. When your Heavenly Father is first, He will direct you by His guidance and wisdom into prioritizing them. Too many Christians flounder through life when God wants us to have fulfilled, meaningful lives. It only happens as we keep the main Person the main focus of our lives. Christian priority No. 1: God must come first.

Can we help you spiritually? Can we help you know Jesus better? Please check out more resources on our church's web page, Gracechurchwi.org. Or, call us at 262.763.3021. If you'd like to know more about how Jesus can change your life, I'd love to mail you a copy of how Jesus changed my life in "My Story." E-mail me at Carson@gracechurchwi.org to request a free copy. Please include your mailing address. 

A Crash of Selfishness

 

“The DNA of sin is selfishness. Sin inserts me into the middle of my universe; the one place reserved for God and God alone. Sin reduces my field of concern down to my wants, my needs, and my feelings. Sin really does make it all about me.”  Paul Tripp

 
  It’s a scene so shocking that you may want to Google it to see it for yourself. As this year’s bicyclists in the Tour de France started off, a self-absorbed fan attempting to pose for the TV cameras caused a horrible crash that plunged the first stage of the Tour de France into chaos.
  The disastrous crash was caused by a woman standing on the roadside of the Tour’s opening stage. To make sure that she was on TV, she stepped in front of the racing pack holding a cardboard sign, displaying a message for the cameras. With one foot on the road and her cardboard sign encouraging riders to “Go!” hanging out onto the course, the spectator’s head was turned in the opposite direction of the cyclists when disaster struck.
  Her sign was in the direct path of the first cyclist, German rider, Tony Martin, who was cycling near the head of the pack. He fell, which led to the subsequent crash of dozens of riders behind him. Cyclists then began to fall en masse as the crash left bikes and bodies tangled in the road. The crash held the race up for several minutes. Multiple bikes were damaged as a result of the crash but the injury toll to riders wasn’t immediately clear.
  Later a bloodied Tony Martin returned to the race but Jasha Sutterlin of Germany reportedly withdrew because of the crash. All because one spectator wanted her 15 seconds of fame – the high price of selfishness.
  Behind nearly every marital fight is selfishness. Why do children squabble? Selfishness. At the root of every church split, you’ll find selfishness. The cancer that steals our joy is selfishness. Yet, selfishness is encouraged and applauded in a selfie world. It hides behind phrases like, “I need me time” or “I’ve got to take care of myself.”
  Our sin-contaminated world applauds self-idolization. We pose for selfies, edit our images, and self-promote the best parts of our lives. We post selfies to get “likes” and admiration, while the time we spend thinking of ourselves grows like an out-of-control noxious weed. Our selfies scream, “Look at me! Look at what I’m doing! Look at what I have!”
  Our sin nature feeds our selfish passions. We improve our looks. We do more document-worthy stuff. We acquire more things to “snap” and “share.” While we may not be famous on Instagram, most of us think of ourselves far too much. Scrolling through or actively posting to social media adds to such overthinking. The less we guard ourselves in a selfie world, the more we turn the lens of our hearts inward. It’s our story that matters – our needs, wants, and desires. Yet, the selfish person struggles with insecurity and is often overwhelmed with doubt. Selfishness starves our souls, contaminates our lives with unhappiness and even anger, when “I” don’t have my needs met.
  Apart from the power of the Gospel, it’s difficult to be selfless. Even when we’re caring for others, there’s a voice inside whispering, “I hope others are watching to see how much I care.” It’s only when we know the sacrificial Savior that we can truly have victory over being self-absorbed.
  How can we have victory over selfishness? The answer is love. The greatest commandments are the foundation for all Christian ethics and for the Christian life: “And Jesus said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets’” (Matt. 22:37-40).
  As we devote ourselves to loving God and loving our neighbors, we turn our attention away from inside of ourselves. This call to love is fundamental, demanding, and only possible for those who have been born again by the Spirit of God because God is love. Love requires selflessness. Though it seems counterintuitive, it’s only as we love God and others that we have joy, peace and contentment. Those are never found in self-love. How do we demonstrate the distinctiveness of Christian love?
  Love values the other person. Each person we meet is Imago Dei, thus we don’t confuse love with the counterfeits of lust, sentimentality, or self-gratification. While love includes wonderful, warm feelings, it’s much more than a feeling. Love is a decision. We choose to love. God loved us not because we had something to offer Him, but rather because He had something to offer us. “For God loved the world in this way: He gave His One and Only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). God chose to love us so that He could demonstrate His mercy to us in the person of His Son.
  Love is vulnerable to the other. Love opens up its life to another person. It breaks down barriers and exposes the heart. Selfless love is the most costly investment you will ever make.
  C. S. Lewis, in The Four Loves, describes the vulnerable nature of love, “To love is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries. Avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket - safe, dark, motionless, airless - it will change. It will not be broken. Instead, it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.”
  Love is costly. It takes risks and goes out on a limb. Love makes a statement and leaves a legacy. It does the unexpected, surprising, and stirring. It performs acts that steal the heart and leaves an impression on the soul. Often these acts are never forgotten.
  A little girl named Liz was suffering from a rare life-threatening disease. Her only chance of recovery appeared to be a blood transfusion from her 5-year-old brother, who had somehow survived the same disease but had developed the antibodies needed to combat the illness. The doctor explained the situation to her little brother and asked the little boy if he’d be willing to give his blood to his sister. He hesitated for only a moment before taking a deep breath and saying, “Yes, I’ll do it if it will save her.”
  As the transfusion progressed, he lay in bed next to his sister and smiled, seeing the color returning to her cheeks. Then, his face grew pale and his smile faded. He looked up at the doctor and asked with a trembling voice, “Will I start to die right away?” The little boy had misunderstood the doctor. He thought he was going to have to give his sister all of his blood in order to save her. That’s love. Love is selfless and sacrificial. As someone insightfully wrote: “Nothing is more a contradiction than to profess to be a Christian and live for oneself.”

Can we help you spiritually? Can we help you know Jesus better? Please check out more resources on our church's web page, Gracechurchwi.org. Or, call us at 262.763.3021. If you'd like to know more about how Jesus can change your life, I'd love to mail you a copy of how Jesus changed my life in "My Story." E-mail me at Carson@gracechurchwi.org to request a free copy. Please include your mailing address. 

Are the Catholic Bishops Bigots?

 

“We have no right to prejudice another in his civil enjoyments because he is of another church.”  Thomas Jefferson

 

  A Belgian farmer accidentally altered the border of Belgium and France after moving a boundary stone to make way for his tractor. A history enthusiast walking the national border between France and Belgium was the first to notice that one of the stones marking the boundary between the countries since 1819 had been displaced by more than 7 feet—making France smaller and Belgium larger. Officials with the Belgian government said they’ve asked the farmer to return the stone to its proper place. Failing that, the long-dormant Franco-Belgian border commission will have to resolve the dispute. “We should be able to avoid a new border war,” neighboring French Mayor Aurélie Welonek told La Voix du Nord.
  There’s been a growing movement to move the boundaries of religious freedom and rights of faith groups for the last fifty years. It’s moving toward a “holy war” though one side will fight in the courts to preserve one of our greatest blessings of the United States, a blessing that was essentially unknown in any other nation until the birth of America – the 1^st Amendment: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…” 

  But it’s not Congress that has continually infringed on our 1^st Amendment rights, it’s the courts as judicial activists which was never the intent of our Founding Fathers. A continual phrase that’s used to justify these egregious actions against people of faith is the “separation of Church and State.”
  Educated individuals know that the phrase is not in the Constitution. It was Jefferson, in personal correspondence, when he was President, who used it referring to the State meddling in the affairs of the Church, not the Church seeking to control the State.
  Enemies of the Church continually seek to manipulate the court of public opinion with accusations of hate, bigotry, meanness. They use slurs and emotionalism rather than objective truth and reasoned argument. No longer content to seek to eradicate religious rights and secularize the public square, they now seek secularization within religious groups and will not be satisfied until all people of faith are goose-stepping with their agenda.
  A clear example of this is the attack on the Catholic Church for refusing Holy Communion to pro-abortion politicians. As a Bible-believing Christian, I do not believe in the sacramental teaching of the Catholic Church and have fundamental theological differences on an entire range of issues from the authority of Scripture, justification by faith alone, all of the Solas of the Reformation and would even differ with their view of birth control. Yet, this is a shared moral conviction on the sanctity and dignity of human life. If we believe in the Bill of Rights in general and the 1^st Amendment specifically, we must defend the Catholic Church’s right to govern their church as they see fit and hold to their convictions.
  Some years ago our family visited Salt Lake City and the Mormon Tabernacle but were not allowed entry into the Temple because we weren’t LDS. Holding certain dogma and restrictions is common to nearly every religion. Muslims limit non-Muslims from their mosques and holy sites and Jews limit even Jewish women from certain places. Religious groups limiting access to worship settings or practices is common as it fits their belief system. Christianity is rare in that there are no spaces where unbelievers are not welcome, though they, like the Catholic Church, may limit participation in certain religious practices.
  While President Biden is our second Catholic president, he is the most pro-abortion president in our history and is out of touch with popular opinion. A recent survey found that while 61% said abortion should be legal in most or all cases during the first trimester, in the second trimester, about two-thirds of respondents, 65%, said abortion should be illegal in most or all cases, and in the third, 80% of respondents oppose abortion.
  Catholic dogma teaches that abortion is murder. The outcry of cruelty in refusing holy communion to pro-abortion politicians brings to my mind the baptism scene in The Godfather near the end of the movie. While the new Godfather, Michael Corleone, is being asked by the priest baptizing his son, “Do you renounce Satan and all of his works?” To which he responds, “I do renounce them.” At that very same time Corleone is having his rivals assassinated. Movie director, Francis Ford Coppola, brilliantly contrasted the murderous evil Corleone had ordered while going through the motions of verbalizing righteousness in parenting the new life of his son.
  Everyone knows that the Catholic Church is unapologetically pro-life. One wonders if those appalled that Catholics are being consistent would agree to allowing them to refuse anyone from communion. Should they be forced to offer communion to anyone? What about a devil worshipper, or a Nazi or white supremacist? Does a faith group’s precious beliefs mean anything or must it cave to the court of evolving morality and public opinion. Faith groups, in light of the clear wording of the 1^st Amendment, must be able to refuse communion or anything else to those they believe violates their sacred tenets, in this case, the sanctity of life.  
  The Catholic Church is sending a powerful message in that Archbishop Cordileone, the Archbishop of San Francisco issued a pastoral letter on the human dignity of the unborn, Holy Communion and Catholics in public life. He writes: “This is especially a time for us Catholics, whose faith calls us to advocate for the universal good of a consistent ethic of life in every stage and in every condition to call our country back to respect for human life…and this is especially so for Catholics who are prominent in all walks of public life, entertainment, media, politics, education, the corporate world, and so forth, as they have such a powerful influence on shaping the attitudes and practices of people in our nation.”
  Mark it down. People of faith and conviction will not compromise even if courts or public opinion rage against them. We can’t. We answer to a Higher Authority. As Peter answered the government of his day, “We must obey God rather than men” (Acts 5:29). In 2,000 years the Church has not surrendered, Look at China and Iran if you want to see how the Church will respond to pressure and persecution. I’m thankful for the 1^st Amendment, but God’s people will still do right and act righteously even if someday we no longer have it. “We must obey God rather than men.”

Can we help you spiritually? Can we help you know Jesus better? Please check out more resources on our church's web page, Gracechurchwi.org. Or, call us at 262.763.3021. If you'd like to know more about how Jesus can change your life, I'd love to mail you a copy of how Jesus changed my life in "My Story." E-mail me at Carson@gracechurchwi.org to request a free copy. Please include your mailing address.