Revival In the Home: Loving Your Children

I'm going to be posting different articles and things that have blessed me on raising children on this thread. Nothing could be more important than raising our children. Feel free to comment or post whatever the Lord leads you to.

Loving Your Child
by Charles F. Stanley

As parents, we want our children to love us, spend time with us, take vacations with us, talk to us, listen to us, and be involved in our lives for as long as we live. More importantly, we would like them to want to do those things. But if we don’t love them unconditionally now, they won’t be around in the future—they will have abandoned our families.

In his excellent book How to Really Love Your Child, Ross Campbell gives a definition of unconditional love that bears repeating:

What is unconditional love? Unconditional love is loving a child no matter what. No matter what the child looks like. No matter what his assets liabilities, handicaps. No matter what we expect him to be and most difficult, no matter how he acts. This does not mean, of course, that we always like his behavior. Unconditional love means we love the child even at times we may detest his behavior. (How to Really Love Your Child [New York: New American Library, 1982], p. 30)

“But,” you say, “am I not responsible to help them develop to the fullest of their potential? Are there not times when I need to push a little?”

Absolutely! In fact, motivating your children to excellence and improvement is in itself a part of expressing unconditional love and acceptance to them. To allow children simply to get by in life is a form of rejection.

If you are to motivate your children to excellence without expressing an attitude of conditional acceptance, two things must be true. First, all your prodding and motivating must be preceded by demonstrations of your unconditional love for your children. There must be memorials, so to speak, to their worthiness in your eyes. By memorials I mean events or conversations that have clearly expressed your love.

Memorials such as these are beneficial because they give your children something to recall for reassurance when you apply properly motivated pressure to perform. Sometimes you will expect too much from your children, and they will fail. These reminders of your unconditional acceptance make it easier for them to face you when the bottom drops out.

Memorials can also take the form of a gift or even the bestowal of certain privileges. In presenting the gift, stress several times that it is not connected with any particular occasion or activity on their part; you are just giving it just because you love them.

Second, to properly motivate your child, you must measure them by their own ability not somebody else’s. Comparing one child’s performance to that of another child eventually destroys the child’s self-esteem, along with self-esteem go expressions of individuality and creativity.

The real key here is to view each of your children as a unique individual. Each child is gifted in some particular area. Your goal as a parent is to recognize that area of strength and emphasize it as your child develops, for in these areas of strength lies your child’s greatest potential for excellence. By cultivating these areas, you will do great things for child’s self-esteem as well.

One good way to find out whether or not your children feel unconditional acceptance is simply to ask them: What do you think it would take for you to make Mom and Dad as proud of you as we could possibly be?

Evaluate the answer carefully. Is it task oriented? Is it performance oriented? Do they feel they must do all their chores every day? Do they feel they must make straight A’s? Do they feel they must make a team or squad or perform some other public-oriented task?

Or is the answer more character oriented? Do they feel they would make you proud by simply doing the best they can at every task they undertake? Do they feel they would make you proud by obeying God, regardless of the cost? Do they feel they would make you proud by standing alone in a situation where they were asked to compromise?

The answer, if they are honest, will clue you in on what kind of value system they have picked up at home. The answer will give you insight into what you have communicated, regardless of what you may have been saying. It is this value system that will serve as a basis upon which they accept themselves and others.

Simply telling your children that you accept them unconditionally is not enough. If what you tell them is contradicted by how you treat them, you will not convince them of your unconditional acceptance, and you will cause confusion that could lead to more serious problems.

The apostle John knew the importance of demonstrating unconditional love. In his first epistle he wrote, “My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth” (1 John 3:18). That is my point exactly. Unconditional love and acceptance are communicated more clearly by what we do and how we do it than simply by what we say.

When I need assurance that God really does love me and accept me unconditionally, I don’t look for verses that say those words per se. My comfort comes from Christ’s work on the cross. His death for me leaves no room for doubt, for he has loved us “in deed and in truth.” In the same way, our children must have a backlog of memories to sustain their belief that we truly love and accept them unconditionally.

Unconditional love tells our children that they are loved for who they are, despite what they do. What security and acceptance this provides for them! Do you want to encourage your kids to succeed? You don’t need to push expectations on them. If we direct their focus to the Lord, then they will want to be obedient and do their best for Him. They will think, “Dad and Mom will be pleased with me, but I want to do my best for God.” If you are telling your kids that you love them no matter what, then you are expressing exactly what God communicates to us.

When I was growing up, I didn’t do so well in high school. Everything turned out okay, but I didn’t have a good start. So, I never told my kids that I expected them to make “As” or “Bs” or “Cs” while they were in school. I didn’t tell them they had to make the baseball team or be the most popular. The question was, “Did you do your best?” For our daughter, an A was her best in geometry; for our son, his best was a C. I highly recommend that parents adopt these two standards for raising their children because character development in clearly emphasized over performance. I always said to my kids, “I just want you to obey God and do your best, and even when you fail, I will still love you just as much, just the way you are.”

Never take for granted the impact that you have on their lives; remember, the way you act toward your kids today greatly influences the way they will respond to you tomorrow.

Adapted from “How to Keep Your Kids on Your Team,” by Charles F. Stanley. 1986. pp. 51-62.

These are some quotes from a series of Letters by:

The Rev. and President Charles G. Finney;

The Rev. and Reformer John Wesley;

The Rev. and President Asa Mahan;

The Rev. and President Jonathan Edwards;

The Rev. George Whitefield

[url=http://truthinheart.com/trainchild.html#N_1_]The Right Way To Train Up A Child[/url]

Charles G. Finney:

"Avoid all conversation in their presence upon topics that may mislead them and generate in them a hypercritical and wicked spirit, such as all sectarian conversation, unguarded conversation upon the doctrine of decrees and election, speaking of neighbors' faults, or speaking derogatorily of any human being; in short whatever may be a stumbling block to their infant minds.

Avoid all disagreement between the parents in regard to the government of the children.

Avoid all partiality or favoritism in the government of them.

Avoid whatever may lessen the respect of the children for either parent.

Avoid whatever may lessen the authority of either parent. Avoid whatever may tend to create partiality for either parent.

Avoid begetting in them the love of money. Diligently remember that the love of money is the root of all evil.

Avoid the love of money yourself, for if you have a worldly spirit yourself, your whole life will most impressively inculcate the lesson that the world should be the great object of pursuit. A wealthy man once said to me, "I was brought up from my very infancy to love the world and make money my god." When we consider how impressively and constantly this lesson is taught by many parents, is it surprising that there is so much fraud, theft, robbery, piracy, and selfishness under every abominable form? Many parents seem to be engaged in little else, so far as their influence with their children is concerned, than making them as selfish and worldly as possible. Nearly their whole conversation at the table, and in all places where they are, the whole drift and bent of their lives, pursuits, and everything about them, are calculated to make the strongest impression upon their little minds, that their parents conceive the world to be the supreme good. Unless all this be avoided, it is impossible to train up a child in the way he should go.

Avoid begetting within them the spirit of ambition to be rich, great, learned, or anything else but good. If you foster a spirit of selfish ambition it will give birth, of course, to anger, pride, and a whole herd of devilish passions.

Avoid begetting or fostering the spirit of vanity in any way: in the purchase of clothing or any articles of apparel, in dressing them or by any expressions relating to their personal appearance. Be careful to say nothing about your own clothes, or the apparel of anybody else or of the personal attractions or beauty of yourself, your children, or of anybody else in such a way as to beget within them the spirit of ambition, pride and vanity.

Guard them against any injurious influence at home. Allow nobody to live in your family whose sentiments, habits, manners, or temper may corrupt your children. Guard the domestic influence as the apple of your eye. Have no person in your house that will tell them foolish stories, sing them foolish songs, talk to them about witches, or anything of any name or nature which ought not to come before their youthful minds.

Be careful under what influences you leave them when you go from home, and let not both parents take a journey at the same time, leaving their children at home, without apparent necessity.

Avoid every evil influence from outside the home. Let no children visit them whose conversation or manners may corrupt them. Let them associate with no children by going to visit where they will run the hazard of being in any way corrupted. Avoid the cultivation of artificial appetites. Accustom them to no non-nutritious stimulants or condiments of any kind, for in so doing you will create a craving for stimulants that may result in beastly intemperance.

Avoid creating any artificial needs. The great majority of human needs are merely artificial, and children are often so brought up as to feel as if they needed multitudes of things, which they do not need, and which are really injurious to them, and if they ever become poor, their artificial needs will render them extremely miserable, if indeed they do not tempt them. Consider how simple and few the real needs of human beings are, and whatever your worldly circumstances may be, for your children's sake, for truth's sake, for righteousness' sake, and for Christ's sake, habituate them to being satisfied with the supply of their real needs.

Avoid by all means their being the subjects of evil communications. "Evil communications corrupt good manners." This is the testimony of God. If your domestics, your hired hands, your neighbors' children or anybody else, are allowed to communicate to them things which they ought not to know, they will be irrecoverably injured and perhaps forever ruined.

Avoid their reading books that contain pernicious sentiments, anything indecent, vulgar, or of ill report.

Avoid their reading romances, plays, and whatever may beget within them a romantic and feverish state of mind.

Avoid allowing gluttony or any sort of intemperance, eating at improper times, improper foodstuffs, improper quantities of food, and everything that shall work a violation of the laws of life and health.

Avoid all unnecessary occasion of excitement. Children are naturally enough excited. Pains should be taken to quiet and keep them calm rather than to increase their excitement. This is imperiously demanded both by their health and minds. Clubs are often started among children, and great pains taken to stir up an interest and excitement, insomuch that it is often attended with a loss of appetite and sleep, and a serious injury to their health and morals. Parents should be on their guard, against allowing their children to be drawn into such excitement or having any unnecessary connection with or knowledge of them. *

This subject will be resumed.

Your brother in the bonds of the gospel,

Charles G. Finney

* Lest the reader get a wrong impression of Mr. Finney's advice we add the following lifetime observation of one of his first students and later 3rd President after him at Oberlin College:

"Perhaps the most characteristic feature of the inner man was the depth and intensity of his emotional nature. This gave energy and power to every movement and every expression; every thought radiated both heat and light, and the two were to him inseparable. To see and to feel a truth were to him one and the same thing; and his hearers were, to a great extent, impressed in the same way. His range of feeling was as broad and varied as his thought. He was not only stern and solemn as a prophet, from his sympathy with God and with all righteousness and holiness, but in turn as gentle and affectionate as a child, attracting children to himself as if he were one of them. In his own family and with his friends, his manner was characterized and tempered by a genial playfulness which set aside constraint, and made all feel at home in his presence."

President Finney—The Preacher, The Teacher, and The Man—Sermon by President Fairchild. In, Reminiscences of Rev. Charles G. Finney. Speeches and Sketches at the Gathering of his Friends and Pupils, in Oberlin, July 28th, 1876 (after his resent death)."

August 26, 1840

Dear Brethren and Sisters:

In pursuing this subject I will notice several other things to be avoided in the training of children.

Avoid everything that can be construed by them into insincerity on any subject, especially everything that may make the impression that your word is not to be depended upon.

Avoid every appearance of impatience or fretfulness in their presence.

Wholly abstain from scolding at them. If you have occasion to reprove them, let it be done with deliberation, and not in such haste and in such tones of voice as to have even the appearance of anger.

If you have occasion to punish them, first converse and pray with them, and avoid proceeding to severe measures until you have fully made the impres- sion upon their minds that it is your solemn and imperative duty to do so.

Avoid in your conversation whatever might have a tendency to beget in them the spirit of slander and evil speaking. Never let them hear you speak evil of any man. But always, in their presence, as on all other occasions, "be gentle, showing all meekness to all men."

Avoid as far as possible whatever may be a temptation to them to indulge evil tempers. "Fathers, provoke not your children to anger," is both the counsel and the command of God. If you find your children naturally irritable and easily made angry, be sure to keep this verse always in your mind, that you may readily and certainly practice it whenever there is occasion to do so. If, therefore, you find your children inclined to the exercise of any evil temper whatever, be sure, as far as possible, to avoid all occasions that may prove too great a trial for them, and cause them to fall into their besetting sin.

Avoid unnecessarily exciting their fears upon any subject. Allow no one to make them afraid of the dark, or of Indians, or of witches, or of wild animals. Children are often very seriously injured by creating a morbid excitability upon such subjects, insomuch that from that time on they are afraid to be alone in the dark. And their foolish fears are often excited even at an older age, in view of things with which they were foolishly persecuted in their youth.

Never give them anything because they cry for it. If they find that they can get anything by crying for it, or that they are any more apt to get it because they cry for it, you will find yourselves continually annoyed by their crying. Children should be taught that if they cry for a thing, for that very reason they cannot have it.

I will now proceed to mention several things to be attended to in the training of children. First, be honest, and thorough, and correct in forming your own views and opinions on all subjects. This is of great importance. For if your children find you often mistaken in your views upon some important subjects, your opinions will soon cease to have much weight with them. It is immensely important that you be well instructed, and know how to answer their questions, especially on all moral subjects. Your opinions ought to carry great weight with them. It is for their own good. Your opinions will naturally carry great weight with them unless they find you in error. Be careful, then, as you wish to preserve your own influence over them for their good, and as you would not want to mislead them to their ruin, to be thorough and diligent in the use of means to obtain correct information on all moral questions.

Let your own habits be both right and regular: your rising in the morning, your retiring at night, the hours at which you take your meals, together with all your domestic arrangements. Let order pervade everything, and be sure to have a time and a place for every work, and everything around you. Have a place for every tool, and let every member of your family be constrained to keep everything in its place. And if they have occasion to use any tool, they ought to be sure to return it to its place before they put it out of their hands. By insisting upon this, you will soon save yourself and them a great deal of unnecessary trouble.

Be sure that they are up early in the morning, and retire early at night. This is imperiously demanded by their health and almost universally by their morals. If children are allowed to be up late in the evening, they will not only lie in bed late in the morning, but almost always get into the habit of either making or receiving visits from neighboring children. This will bring in its train a host of evils.

See that your temper and spirit are right. "Let the peace of God that passeth all understanding dwell in your hearts, that you may possess your soul in patience." And never allow your angry feeling to come into collision with theirs.

Let the influence which you have over them be an ever present consideration with you. Do not forget it. Do not be unmindful of it, even for an hour or a moment. In whatever you say and do in their presence, have an eye to its influence upon them.

Your brother in the bonds of the gospel,

Charles G. Finney

destinysweet wrote:
In reading these wise words,I am able to identify the places I wish I had been given the advise earlier,that I might have actively watched over my own brood armed with this understanding.I am also inspired to give thanks to God for making certain I set the right example..because it is by His grace alone that I have been able to see where I have made a positive impact for the highest good.and through His mercy I am still able to continue guiding and apologizing when I see where I have contributed to their difficulty in making right choices.

I think most any parent can read this and see areas where they have made mistakes. I hope others do not read this and think "legalism" or "judgement" on their parenting skills but some good guidelines that we can follow coupled with grace.

I found this devotional called [url=http://www.amazon.com/dp/1888692073?tag=evegoopat-20&camp=14573&creative=327641&linkCode=as1&creativeASIN=1888692073&adid=0J623WN6F33TPNR3BKQF&]"Our 24 Family Ways: Family Devotional Guide."[/url] It's been recommended by alot of homeschoolers. If anyone has any more suggestions on devotions or how you have family devotions that you would like to share I would love to hear them.

"Had we continued perfect as God created the first man, perhaps the perfection of our nature had been a sufficient self-instructor for every one. But as sickness and diseases have created the necessity of medicines and physicians, so the disorders of our rational nature have introduced the necessity of education and tutors...."

~ John Wesley

....David's psalms of daily use in devotion, and Solomon's proverbs in conversation; it will be greatly to your advantage to be well versed in them... When you only hear your children read the Bible, they are tempted to look upon it as not more but a school book; but when they hear you read it to them in a solemn, religious manner, it comes as it ought, with more authority....

Thanks Paul, Psalms and Proverbs have always been on my heart when teaching my children.

On Family Devotions:

Family Altar

Establish a family altar. Build it out of unmovable rocks of resolution. Your time of family devotions should (almost) be non-negotiable. It should be priority for your whole family. Don’t be legalistic about it, but as much as you possibly can, put all other things aside before you postpone or cancel family devotions.

It will be an altar of sacrifice. You will sacrifice your time, sometimes your dignity, and your energy. For years, our kids heard, “Six o’clock…reading time.” That meant that Sue and I dropped anything we were doing, the kids did the same, and we gathered together as a family. You will find that there are many excuses for not having devotions. You may feel pressed for time, tired, or you will want to catch up on the news of the world, or perhaps you will think that you don’t have the ability to teach the Bible. There is, however, one very powerful reason why you should have daily devotions…the eternal salvation of your children.

Here now are some practical points to consider for establishing your altar:

1. Open in prayer. If you are a male, take the lead. If you are a single parent, step into the role of a confident leader. If you are not used to praying out loud, have everyone close their eyes while you pray so that they won’t see you. Begin by thanking God for your family and then simply ask Him to open His Word to each of you. As time goes by, ask one of the children to open in prayer, to build up their confidence when it comes to public prayer. It is wise to keep public prayer reasonably short.

2. Open the Bible. Don’t worry about your lack of “teaching” ability. Simply read five verses from one of the Gospels. Then have each of the family members read five verses, stopping now and then and asking what they think a particular verse means. Go through the verses beforehand and prepare some questions. Be ready for (and don’t be discouraged by) a regular “I dunno.” Tell them what you think the verse means, and carry on with the reading. Follow any cross-references.

3. Open the hearts of your children. Deliberately draw your kids out of themselves. Talk around the world. It doesn’t matter if the subject doesn’t relate directly to the reading. Let the conversation swing to what they have done that day. Let them express their desires and thoughts. Communicate with them. Show interest in their interests. This can be a time for building relationships. If you want to make life long friends of your children, start while they are young. Don’t wait until they are teenagers to do this. It may be too late.

4. Forget your inhibitions. Don’t worry about your dignity. Play act with your kids when they are small. Be Goliath, and let each of them have a turn at being David. Have them throw a cushion or something at you, and fall down when you get hit. Act out Daniel in the lion’s den. Be a lion. Roar. Play out a Bible story with them whenever you can. It will help them retain the principles behind the story. If I remember rightly, when kids hear something, they retain 30% of what’s heard. If they hear and see something, they retain 70%. But if they actually experience something (see, hear and participate in), they retain 90% (I can’t remember the exact statistics, because I only heard them). Use the time when they are young and impressionable to impress upon them biblical truths. I was deeply into play-acting until one memorable day. I was rolling around on the floor doing something incredibly funny, when I looked up and saw that none of my children were even cracking a smile. It was then that I realized that they were no longer impressed.

5. Don’t make the devotional time too long. Keep it to 10-15, perhaps 20 minutes. Have them repeat a memory verse (from the reading) together six times. Do the same verse each night during the week. If they remember it at the end of the week, give them some sort of reward (we often gave our kids a candy bar). The reward is important. We all need an incentive and a candy bar is a good incentive. Perhaps you could have them write verses they remember in a book, and review it regularly.

6. If you want to keep the attention of your children, thoroughly flavor the reading with anecdotes. An anecdote is a short story that illustrates something special. Jesus used them all the time (parables). They will make your teaching palatable. Make them short, and preferably humorous. We have plenty of these in, The Evidence Bible (Bridge-Logos Publishers).

7. Close the reading in prayer, asking God to help you and your family to remember the lessons they have learned.

~Ray Comfort

https://www.sermonindex.net/modules/articles/index.php?view=article&aid=16684

If you are not used to praying out loud, have everyone close their eyes while you pray so that they won’t see you.

That parts funny! :-) It's nice though to get a different slant on how others do devotions.

(Godly Home) Part 15 - Father - the Anointed Teacher by Denny Kenaston

Scripture(s): Deuteronomy 6:4-7

"Description: Brother Denny exhorts fathers in their God-appointed role to "live on the edge of the impossible" by trusting God to work through them. He shares on six holy qualities a father must have to effectively teach his children. Kenaston strongly advocates making family devotions a top priority and shares from personal experience how the Lord has wrought godliness in his home through adopting that....."

https://www.sermonindex.net/modules/mydownloads/singlefile.php?lid=7319&commentView=itemComments

I highly recommend the book [url=http://www.visionforum.com/booksandmedia/productdetail.aspx?productid=85726&categoryid=126]Ten P's in a Pod[/url]
Here is an interview of the book that I found on [url=http://www.amazon.com/Ten-Ps-Pod-Million-Mile-Journal/dp/1929241895]Amazon[/url]

[i]"Being a family that wants to honor God and obey His Word ourselves, it was neat to hear the adventures of the Arnold Pent family. They traveled all across North America, often wondering where they would sleep or where their next meal would come from or how they would pay for gas. But they trusted God and He always provided.

As a father, this book gave me a vision for teaching my family the Bible--hearing how much importance Mr. Pent placed on READING the Bible. Before breakfast, and after every meal--regardless of where they were or who they were staying with.

DON'T GET ME WRONG--This is not a boring, stiff, how-to kind of book that makes you feel guilty. It's just a FUN story about a family who was very different from your typical family. Almost every page made our whole family laugh."[/i]

Even though my father has led our family in devotions for many years, this book really influenced us to spend more time reading the Bible. While we don't do as much as the Pents - 30 minutes after each meal - we definitely read more than we did before reading this book.

The book is also an audio book and it was almost better listening to [url=http://www.visionforum.com/booksandmedia/productdetail.aspx?productid=85728&categoryid=126]the author read the book[/url] then it was just reading it myself. :)

Roniya wrote:
I highly recommend the book [url=http://www.visionforum.com/booksandmedia/productdetail.aspx?productid=85726&categoryid=126]Ten P's in a Pod[/url]
Here is an interview of the book that I found on [url=http://www.amazon.com/Ten-Ps-Pod-Million-Mile-Journal/dp/1929241895]Amazon[/url]

[i]"Being a family that wants to honor God and obey His Word ourselves, it was neat to hear the adventures of the Arnold Pent family. They traveled all across North America, often wondering where they would sleep or where their next meal would come from or how they would pay for gas. But they trusted God and He always provided.

As a father, this book gave me a vision for teaching my family the Bible--hearing how much importance Mr. Pent placed on READING the Bible. Before breakfast, and after every meal--regardless of where they were or who they were staying with.

DON'T GET ME WRONG--This is not a boring, stiff, how-to kind of book that makes you feel guilty. It's just a FUN story about a family who was very different from your typical family. Almost every page made our whole family laugh."[/i]

Even though my father has led our family in devotions for many years, this book really influenced us to spend more time reading the Bible. While we don't do as much as the Pents - 30 minutes after each meal - we definitely read more than we did before reading this book.

The book is also an audio book and it was almost better listening to [url=http://www.visionforum.com/booksandmedia/productdetail.aspx?productid=85728&categoryid=126]the author read the book[/url] then it was just reading it myself. :)

The book is also an audio book and it was almost better listening to [url=http://www.visionforum.com/booksandmedia/productdetail.aspx?productid=85728&categoryid=126]the author read the book[/url] then it was just reading it myself. :)

415 min. of audio and for a great price. There is even a sample of the audio [url=http://www.visionforum.com/booksandmedia/productdetail.aspx?productid=85728&categoryid=126]here[/url] too.

This is something I would probably play as my kids are lying down at night for bed. :-) The book would be great for devotions too. Thanks, Joy.

"If you desire without loss of time to strike at the root of their pride, teach your children as soon as possibly you can that they are fallen spirits; that they are fallen short of that glorious image of God wherein they were at first created; that they are not now, as they were once, incorruptible pictures of the God of glory; bearing the express likeness of the wise, the good, the holy Father of spirits; but more ignorant, more foolish, and more wicked, than they can possibly conceive. Show them that in pride, passion, and revenge, they are now like the devil. And that in foolish desires and grovelling appetites they are like the beasts of the field. Watch over them diligently in this respect, that whenever occasion offers you may "pride in its earliest motions find," and check the very first appearance of it.

If you ask, "But how shall I encourage them when they do well, if I am never to commend them?" I answer, I did not affirm this. I did not say, "You are never to commend them." I know many writers assert this, and writers of eminent piety. They say, to commend man is to rob God, and therefore condemn it altogether. But what say the scriptures? I read there that our Lord himself frequently commended his own disciples; and the great Apostle scruples not to commend the Corinthians, Philippians, and divers others to whom he writes. We may not therefore condemn this altogether. But I say, use it exceeding sparingly. And when you use it let it be with the utmost caution, directing them at the same moment to look upon all they have as the free gift of God, and with the deepest self-abasement to say, "Not unto us! Not unto us! But unto thy name give the praise!..."

~John Wesley

As we grow in the knowledge of our Heavenly Father, we will realize not simply the benefits of reading His Word, but the necessity. It will be like our daily bread for us; without it we will be malnourished and unable to live. I used to think that the more 'spiritual' I became, the less I would need to read from the Word daily, but it turned out quite the contrary. In fact, I had never realized how starved I had been until the Lord showed me [i]in my condition[/i] the very reason I restricted my time in the Scriptures to this little. May the Lord give us a hunger for the "pure spiritual milk" of His Word; that we may realize our insufficiency and our utter need for His light to shine upon us; and that we may know the exact measure of that need, so that we know when we've had our fill.

NotMe wrote:
I used to think that the more 'spiritual' I became, the less I would need to read from the Word daily, but it turned out quite the contrary.

Amen, that is so true. There is so much revelation in a single verse of scripture!

"Next to self-will and pride, the most fatal disease is "love of the world." But how studiously do the generality of parents cherish this in its several branches! They cherish "the desire of the flesh," that is, the tendency to seek happiness in pleasing the outward senses, by studying to enlarge the pleasure of tasting in their children to the uttermost; not only giving them before they are weaned other things beside milk, the natural food of children; but giving them, both before and after, any sort of meat or drink that they will take. Yea, they entice them, long before nature requires it, to take wine or strong drink; and provide them with comfits, gingerbread, raisins, and whatever fruit they have a mind to. They feed in them "the desire of the eyes," the propensity to seek happiness in pleasing the imagination, by giving them pretty playthings, glittering toys, shining buckles or buttons, fine clothes, red shoes, laced hats, needless ornaments, as ribbons, necklaces, ruffles; yea, and by proposing any of these as rewards for doing their duty, which is stamping a great value upon them. With equal care and attention they cherish in them the Third branch of the love of the world, "the pride of life;" the propensity to seek their happiness in "the honour that cometh of men." Nor is the love of money forgotten; many an exhortation do they hear on securing the main chance; many a lecture, exactly agreeing with that of the old Heathen, _____ "Get money, honestly if you can; but if not, get money." And they are carefully taught to look on riches and honour as the reward of all their labours."

~John Wesley

".....But herein a difficulty will arise; which it will need much resolution to conquer. Your servants, who will not understand your plan, will be continually giving little things to your children, and thereby undoing all your work. This you must prevent, if possible, by warning them when they first come into your house, and repeating the warning from time to time. If they will do it notwithstanding, you must turn them away. Better lose a good servant than spoil a good child.

Possibly you may have another difficulty to encounter, and one of a still more trying nature. Your mother or your husband's mother, may live with you; and you will do well to show her all possible respect. But let her on no account have the least share in the management of your children. She would undo all that you had done; she would give them their own will in all things. She would humour them to the destruction of their souls, if not of their bodies too. In fourscore years I have not met with one woman that knew how to manage grandchildren. My own mother, who governed her children so well, could never govern one grandchild. In every other point obey your mother. Give up your will to hers. But with regard to the management of your children, steadily keep the reins in your own hands...."

~John Wesley

"....A wise and kind parent will be equally cautious of feeding "the desire of the eyes" in her children. She will give them no pretty playthings, no glittering toys, shining buckles or buttons, fine or gay clothes; no needless ornaments of any kind; nothing that can attract the eye. Nor will she suffer any other person to give them what she will not give them herself. Anything of the kind that is offered may be either civilly refused, or received and laid by. If they are dis- pleased at this, you cannot help it. Complaisance, yea, and temporal interest, must needs be set aside when the eternal interest of your children is at stake.

Your pains will be well requited, if you can inspire them early with a contempt of all finery; and, on the other hand, with a love and esteem for neat plainness of dress: Teaching them to associate the ideas of plainness and modesty; and those of a fine and a loose woman. Likewise, instill into them, as early as possible, a fear and contempt of pomp and grandeur; an abhorrence and dread of the love of money; and a deep conviction; that riches cannot give happiness. Wean them therefore from all these false ends; habituate them to make God their end in all things; and inure them, in all they do, to aim at knowing, loving, and serving God. . . ."

~John Wesley

"...The generality of parents feed and increase the natural falsehood of their children. How often may we hear that senseless word, "No, it was not you; it was not my child that did it; say, it was the cat." What amazing folly is this! Do you feel no remorse, while you are putting a lie in the mouth of your child, before it can speak plain? And do not you think, it will make good proficiency when it comes to years of discretion? Others teach them both dissimulation and lying, by their unreasonable severity; and yet others, by admiring and applauding their ingenious lies and cunning tricks. Let the wise parent, on the contrary, teach them to "put away all lying," and both in little things and great, in jest or earnest, speak the very truth from their heart. Teach them that the author of all falsehood is the devil, who "is a liar and the father of it." Teach them to abhor and despise, not only all lying, but all equivocating, all cunning and dissimulation. Use every means to give them a love of truth,—of veracity, sincerity, and simplicity, and of openness both of spirit and behaviour..."

~John Wesley