It's Just a Book

Parenting in and of itself can be quite challenging.  But when you add in your efforts to walk with the Lord and pass that heritage on to your children; a battle is waged.  It's a spiritual battle and one that I am becoming more and more aware of.  I have made it no secret how much I want my boys to become men of God.  To be honest, I don't want to wait for them to be men.  I want them to be anointed now. I want them to rise up in their innocence and declare who their God is.  My obstacle is my own laziness and mediocrity coupled with a struggle to overcome a legalistic faith.  How do I succeed?

I admit that most days my thoughts are not allowed the luxury of such soul searching.  My feet hit the floor at 5:30am to answer the morning's demands of hot cocoa and a dog needing out.  But this morning I was challenged by my oldest while I tried to break up a fight and resolve the issue in a peaceful manner.  I try when disciplining my boys to use scripture to back up the desired behavior. Well today while on my soap box, he yelled, "why does it always have to be about the Bible? It's just a book!" I stopped for just a moment before I went all cray Christianese on him, and in that brief second I was reminded that he has a free will and some day he was going to have to choose to believe for himself.  I took a deep breath told him that I loved him and that Jesus loved him.  I told him that God's word is alive and powerful and if he wanted to know that in his life all he had to do was ask and the Lord would show him.

The funny thing about walking with the Lord and parenting is that usually I am given insight into my own heart while trying to teach my children. Obviously, while I am attempting to interject God's word into our family's daily life, I have failed to convey the power in His words.  Perhaps that is because I have not let His words live powerfully in my own life.  So now I have a new challenge: to live more fully in the power of His Word and to show my sons that power in a way that grasps their little hearts.

For the word of God is living and powerful and sharper than 

any two edged sword, piercing even to the division

of soul and spirit and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner 

of thoughts and the intents of the heart.

Hebrews 4:12