Raise Them in His Image Not Yours | Word First

So, it's funny when you buy a piece of uh electronic equipment to take home, you get this giant manual that comes home with you. But when you get a child and you bring it home, no one tells you anything. And so, a lot of what we learn about parenting, we learn on the fly. I know that both of you are very concerned about being parents who model well what a Christian parent ought to model. So, I thought it would be interesting for us to take a look at this question of what is the most paradigm shifting moment that you have had as a mom. Um, well, for me it was one of those fun moments that every mom has one day in their life. I woke up and I had a busy day planned full of lots of things that were very important to me. In fact, I think I may have even been teaching Bible study that morning. And I go to pick my son up and he's little and he starts throwing up all over me. And I was so frustrated that I had these very important things to get to. And um I I think the week before I had been teaching in Thessalonians on be joyful always. Pray continually. Give thanks in all circumstances for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus. And it was just like the Holy Spirit stopped me and said, "You had a plan for today, but this is a providentially planned event, and you can either choose to fight it and be angry with your circumstances, or you can let me parent you while you're parenting your children. That this isn't an inconvenience. This is your call for today." And so, it was this huge shift of the fact that what was going on with my children wasn't just about them. that the Lord was after me in the season of motherhood and he was growing me to look more like Christ by developing grace in me and just the willingness to give up my plan for the day and say, "Okay, throw up's plan A for today." Yeah. Parenthood offers its fair share of opportunities to give up our personal freedoms, but what is more Christlike than to set aside your own agenda and take on the more important one? So yeah. What about you Christie? Yeah, I think for me the my paradigm shifting moment there have been lots of them. The shifts happen in stages and phases but uh one for sure with all my children is um when I really embraced the truth that my children are made in the image of God and not in my image and that I shouldn't be molding and shaping them into his image and not mine. And I think it's easy, at least for myself and I think a lot of women to or a lot of parents in general um to want their children to be just like them or just like some better version of themselves or um and and we do, you know, there's a there's a godly ambition in that for our children that we want them to excel and do well and maybe not repeat the same sins and mistakes that we've made as parents perhaps. But um but that when I really embraced the idea that um I need to allow God to shape and mold my children more and more into his likeness um and not be so concerned about you know it's so easy to get caught up in the comparison trap um to compare my children's mistakes their successes you know you want to tweet and Facebook every right you know every fun moment and you want to um hide or sometimes make fun of, you know, the the throw up moments. saying um it's just a lot of temptation for comparison, for discouragement, for um not really training our children in the nurture and instruction of the Lord, but to be tempted to model them after um some worldly or some just um um kind of carnal impression of what we think our children should be like and compares then them to the word um rather than comparing them to the word of God. Yeah. It's it's hard because you you get under this misconception. Well, I gave birth to this child, so I'm this child's creator. But you're not this child's creator. And so, it's that true creator's image that we have to lead them toward and point them toward. But yeah, we lose it sometimes. Mhm. I remember for me uh my watershed moment as a parent was when my oldest child was uh about five and he was just entering into that age where he was having social engagements that were happening, you know, at a house where I might not stay for what was going on. And he got invited to a birthday party and I knew that the plan was to show a movie that I was not crazy about him seeing at his age. He was also one of those kids who just every image got stuck in his head. You know, he's going to have nightmares for weeks. And so I was talking to a mom who was had similar ages of children to mine only she was ahead of me by about four years. And so I was saying to her, I don't know what I should do. Should I, you know, just let him go and not worry about it. I don't want to make this mom feel uncomfortable, you know, and I just didn't I was so concerned about what the other moms were going to think if I intervened and said something. And this mom, she was so patient with me. She listened to me and then she looked at me and she said, "Jen, I believe that I will give an account to God for the way that I have raised these children. So, I don't care what another mother thinks about my parenting decisions. I'm accountable to him." It was so clear and so honestly, can I just say obvious? But it was what I needed to hear to just reframe the whole discussion and realize that nothing was more important than my following my conscience as I knew it to be before the Lord with regard to not just that parenting uh situation but with all of them. And I thank God that she was brave enough to say it to me because you know we don't have all the answers ourselves. And I think that it's nice even in a conversation like this to hear what you guys have said and kind of be like, "Oh my gosh, I need to remember that, too." Because it's a tough thing and there are so many different situations that we're going to face. But to be able to learn selflessness, to be able to learn that our children are image bearsers, not of our image, you know, and to know that we parent as those who will give an account. Those are good things to keep in mind. Amen. Amen.