When we become parents, we learn about love and sacrifice at a whole new level. Parenting pushes us to our limits. We have to pay attention to our own actions, while also trying to shape and influence our kids to be healthy individuals.
Parenting offers the opportunity to learn more about the character of God
The Bible refers to God as our Father. He loves us and cares for us like a parent should. He also demonstrates patience in our failures and a willingness to forgive our mistakes. These are all things we need to incorporate into our parenting. Our kids will fail and they will disappoint us just as we fail and disappoint God. But, we can learn to love them through it.
Galatians 4:6 And because we are his children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, prompting us to call out, “Abba, Father.”
We need to focus on our own personal growth and less on our kids’ behavior
It’s easy to make excuses for ourselves when we lose our temper or lash out in anger because our kids are naughty. But, the truth is, our kids can’t make us act a certain way. We choose to respond how we respond. So, when we lose our cool, that’s on us as parents. We are the adults and we need to model self control and an ability to choose appropriate responses toward our kids.
As we pursue God, we will borrow more of his traits
God relates to us with love, patience, mercy, grace and forgiveness. He doesn’t hold us captive to our mistakes. He allows us to experience consequences but then helps us to learn and grow from our struggles. This is how we need to relate to our kids. The more time we spend with God doing things like reading the Bible and praying, the better we will do at emulating these godly traits in our own lives.
Psalm 103:8 The Lord is compassionate and merciful, slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love.
We have to be intentional in our parenting choices
If we want to be the best parents we can be, we need to make the right choices. We need to submit to God and his desires for us as parents. We need to acknowledge our failures and ask God to help us to overcome them. We need to make the choice not to blame our kids for the kind of parents we are. Instead, we need to model the very behaviors we hope to see in our kids.
Based on the book, “Scream Free Parenting,” learn important tips on how to avoid some common pitfalls so that you can be the best parent you can be.
- Watch the video together or invite someone to summarize the topic.
- What is your initial reaction to this video? Do you disagree with any of it? What jumped out at you?
- On a scale from 1-10, give yourself a grade on how well you’re doing as a parent. Explain.
- What areas of parenting do you struggle with the most?
- Read Galatians 4:6. Describe how God loves you. How can you love your kids more this way?
- How often do you blame your kids for your actions? Why is it wrong to do that?
- Read Psalm 103:8. What can you do to work on patience with your kids?
- Write a personal action step based on this conversation.
