Aha! I bet that subject line roped you in, eh? We all want to achieve success – successful , godly children right?
I’m learning that my initial thoughts and ideas on things are not always what is deeply in my heart. Over the years, I have been asking God to cleanse me, to reveal my heart that I may surrender it to Him. He has been showing me the darkness of my heart. This is scary on the one hand yet good on another because I know that it is because He loves me that He is doing this work.
We all know that there is no formula for guaranteed success with our children, right? Well, I believe that many of us deeply believe that there is a formula:
1 child +homeschool = Success
I also believe that many of us believe there is a recipe for failure, and it looks like this:
1 child + school = Failure.
Oh, I know that when we see it written so boldly like that we don’t agree that we think that way but…when it gets down to the heart of the matter…
In my opinion, this is way to simple and basic and it is missing some key ingredients of which the main one is Relationships.
I have met and had the pleasure of knowing a few Christian young people. Young ones who have a desire to serve God, to serve others and have a great relationship with their parents and siblings. Yet, they were not taught at home. They attended schools. Both public schools and private schools. Upon talking to their parent’s, I came to see that there are some common denominators.
A love for God. A love for their children. They worked at developing and maintaining a relationship WITH their children. They lived together. Played together. Prayed together. Served together. In fact, they worked quite hard at it all… they were committed to parenting.
Is that me? Am I committed to all of that or am I more concerned or consumed with Math and history?
Oh Lord, help me to see that parenting is bigger than ‘lessons’…bigger than homeschooling…help me to play with my children not just pray with them…to serve them and to serve with them.
