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In light of my recent post on the separation of families, I couldn’t go on without sharing this powerful message on the centrality of the home and the value of children and incorporating them into our life. If you haven’t heard of Voddie Baucham, Jr., than you need to look into getting a copy of his book titled, Family Driven Faith (thanks Julie for reminding me of this resource). We haven’t read it yet, but I know it will be good after hearing this sermon.

In a message State Director of Evangelism, Don Cass called “Truly Prophetic,” Voddie Baucham set the auditorium ablaze. The challenge he issued cut straight to the heart of the crisis in contemporary Evangelicalism.

Children are despised in our culture…Christianity in America is dying one home at a time as we are losing our children at a rate of 75% by the end of their freshman year in college! This statistic is staggering…how can we make this change? Who’s job is it to raise your children? Our current strategy for discipling our children is not working…

Listen to it here.

For more sermons and resources by Voddie Baucham, visit this blog.

We attended a wonderful missions conference this past weekend and we came away with many challenges and a few frustrations as well. Aaron and I have been excited about the work of the Lord in the nations since our teens, as we both have been on several missions trips growing up, and God has really implanted a heart to see the nations come to fear and honor our Great God and King. Missions is not limited to those who God has called to the field, we are all called to be a part of missions! Missions is the extension of God’s kingdom to the ends of the earth! It is the gathering together of worshipers from every tribe, tongue, nation and people. It is God’s heart!

What happens though when we are encouraged to set our children aside and pursue our own ministry? Are Christian children jumping ship now because they have not caught the vision of ministry as a family?

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Last night, Aaron & I went out on a much needed date night and left a little fussy girl behind (I think she has some more lovely teeth coming in!). I am thankful to have my family close by to leave her with. The advantage of family is they absolutely love taking the grand baby for an evening! I needed it after a taxing day of fussiness with the baby, piano lessons that didn’t go so well, suffering under the disappointment of breaking one of my nice mixing bowls, and preparing dinner in advance that didn’t taste so good (guess what? We’re eating it tonight all the same!).

We have been working through some communication struggles, and significant business changes for Aaron, so there was much to talk about. Even with Aaron working from home, I am amazed how much we need this time away from it all to build our marriage.

Make it a priority!

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You wrote that you and your husband share a devotion time every morning. May I ask you if you use a devotional book? And what kind of devotional routine do you recommend?

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Psalm 145:4

“One generation shall praise Your works to another, and shall declare Your mighty acts.”

We are called to proclaim the glory of our Lord to the next generation – and who would that be? Our children, our siblings, or simply anyone younger than us that we come in contact with! This should be our main goal and purpose in parenting. If we are purposeful in declaring often of His praises, they will grow to treasure what we treasure. Every moment is a teaching opportunity. If our time spent in conversation together is always centered around the latest movie, sport activity, social event, what do you think they are going to become passionate about? I believe this to be especially true about what we make our family hobbies.

We must always be looking for opportunities for reflecting and sharing how the Lord has changed our life, in addition to how He has worked throughout all the ages. That is why solid history resources are so important! As the saying goes, they who know history will not be doomed to repeat it.

I have been reflecting upon this lately as I have been studying the Scriptures and asking myself, how can I start making this a habit now, even while my baby is too young to understand?

Here are some thoughts:

- Sing truth together and have it playing in your home so they can learn to praise the Lord. I started posting different worship songs over my changing table and singing them to my baby. I want her to hear of the goodness of our God from her infancy.

- Be a worshiper at church for those little eyes are always watching. I have been blessed with parents who love to worship the Lord and you can see it now in the way my siblings worship. There are other families I have observed that the mother and father barely sing, neither were they raising their hands (not that this is necessary, but it is an outward sign of an inward attitude), and guess what? The children were the same way! This has stirred within me a passion to worship the Lord with my whole heart, so my children might see how much He means to me.

- Read the Word together - I am so thankful for the faithfulness of my parents from my youth in getting us up early on a regular basis and reading the Scriptures together. I remember many a time greatly hating this event, waking up early, reading together…boring! But then God transformed my life. I was a new creature! I had a fresh desire to study and know the truth, and I attribute this awakening to the mercy of God but also to the faithfulness of my parents.

- Be students of history! Have lots of good biographies, auto-biographies, history resources for your children. Be students together of the great works of God throughout history. For in fact, it is His Story!

RESOURCES:

Vision Forum supplies some wonderful resources on history. I have been blown away time and time again by their thorough coverage of history. Great resource!

Treasuring God in Our Traditions – by Noel Piper – an excellent resource! She defines a tradition as “a planned habit with significance. Tradition is the handing down of information, beliefs, and worldview from one generation to another by word of mouth and by regular repetition of example, of ceremony, and of celebration. For a Christian, tradition is laying up God’s words in our own hearts and passing his words to the next generation.” She supplies an abundance of ideas of incorporating God-centered traditions in your family life!

Some resources Noel Piper recommends:

My First Book of Questions and Answers by Carine MacKenzie – a resource they used for teaching the catechism to children.
Most of All, Jesus loves You – the story of a lovely bedtime tradition for toddlers and preschoolers.
Hide ‘Em in Your Heart, vols. 1 & 2 by Steve Green. Cassettes or CDs of songs for Bible memory. (We had these on avideo growing up…and I can still remember the verses!)
Leading Little Ones to God by Schooland – Devotional book for preschool and young school aged children (I used this with my younger siblings, a great resource!).
Word & Song Bible, books & CD ed. Steve Elkins – the Pipers used this resource with their children to train them to have their own devotion time when they were too young to read. They also had family devotions, but from their toddlerhood the children would sit down for a short period and use a Bible and audio tape/CD and have their own devotions. Wonderful idea!

Two excellent articles written by the Pipers:

The Family: Together in God Presence
Home-Grown World Christians

Do you have any resource recommendations to share?

Aaron & I spent last evening setting some goals for the new year, while using the questions by Donald Whitney that I listed previously. We also went over the questions provided by Doug Phillips to review God’s Providences on our behalf this past year. It was such a refreshing time together. I will treasure making this a tradition each new year. Having these thoughts, events, areas of growth, etc. recorded will be making our family history so memorable. I am going to paste the document we wrote out in the back of the our photo album for the year.

2007 HIGHLIGHTS

- At a mission conference in the beginning of the year, Aaron & I received a clear burden for missions. The Lord challenged us to be preparing to go rather than just willing to go and planning on staying. We are preparing to go if the Lord calls us!

- The Lord protected us in a crazy car accident in January and provided the funds to repair our car (as we were at fault and had no full coverage insurance).

- We went to Orcas Island in Northern Washington to celebrate our 1 year anniversary in April.

- Karis Ruth arrived on May 4 through a miraculous and a surprise breach birth at home.

- We started a mission mobilizing group in our church to increase mission awareness.

- We had several doors close in business and school plans for Aaron (things we felt like were needed for preparing to go on the field), but God is continuing to lead, direct, and provide for our every need. Even though we are lacking a lot of direction and wisdom in this season, God is faithful and will never leave or forsake us.

- We are growing as parents in learning patience, growing in our communication as a couple, and becoming more faithful prayer warriors.

GOALS FOR 2008

- We both desire to increase our enjoyment of God this year by increasing our reading. I am aiming to read one book each month for a total of 12.

- We are both seeking to keep each other accountable in reading through the Bible in a year. We are using the Discipleship Journal plan for this.

- Fresh structure in our schedule. I am seeking to keep my priorities in the right place by limiting my computer time to when Karis is napping. It has been a distraction and temptation to get on here and blog when she needs my attention first and foremost.

- I want to be in more purposeful prayer for my husband and children (Lord willing!). I have been slacking lately, and will begin afresh by using Stormie Omartian’s prayer cards, which are taken from her book, The Power of A Praying Wife. Powerful prayers that have greatly enriched my prayer life.

- Wiser in my food spending. I am seeking to decrease our food spending this year by starting to make a few more things on my own. I am seeking to eat more nutritiously on a budget (I will definitely be sharing through the process). I am going to start eating more grains and legumes. Mapping out my monthly menu plan is greatly assisting with this. I also want to learn how to make a few of my own dairy products, dressings and condiments.

By God’s grace, I will seek to review these things throughout the year!

How can we begin this New Year off with renewed vision in our calling and also fresh thankfulness at the providences of God over this past year? I found an article by Doug Philipps to be of great encouragement as we prepare for the New Year. He gave three important points, which I am rewriting in condensed form:

1. Chronicle God’s Providence

Ask some of the following questions as a family and record the events of this past year. I thought it would be neat to type these out and keep a notebook as each year goes by. I am going to include this in the photo album I am working on to record the pictures and events of this past year. That way we can treasure the memories we have made together. I am so quick to forget events, my memory is so poor, even at my age. Lord have mercy!

1. Where did I/we travel?
2. What were the titles and key texts of sermons I preached?
3. What books/articles did I write?
4. What significant household projects did we accomplish in 2007?
5. What were the most important meetings of the year?
6. What special friendships were made this year?
7. Which children lost teeth, and how many?
8. Who grew in physical stature, and how much did they grow?
9. Who learned to read this year?
10. What diet and physical exercise regimen did I maintain to honor “my temple”?
11. What books did I read? Did we read as a family? Did my children read?
12. What Scriptures did my family memorize?
13. What loved ones died this year?
14. What were the great personal/ministry/national tragedies and losses of the year?
15. What were the great personal/ministry/national blessings of the year?
16. What were my most significant failures/sins for the year 2007?
17. What unresolved conflicts/issues am I bringing into 2008?
18. What significant spiritual and practical victories did I experience?
19. In what tangible ways did I communicate gratitude to those who have blessed me and invested in my life?
20. What are the top ten themes of 2007 for my family?

2. Say Thank You to those who have invested in your life

He continues by encouraging us to make a list of people who have impacted to your life in the past and this year. Those who have invested, taught, encouraged, discipled you. Write a brief and meaningful letter to each of them. Incorporate your children in this as well. Ask them if there is anyone specific they wish to say thanks to. What a wonderful way to encourage those around us and to express our full appreciation for all the blessings the Lord has bestowed on us through others this year!

He concludes:

One last thought: One reason why Christians are often limited in vision, energy, and blessings is that, contrary to the Lord’s command, we are ungrateful, unforgiving, and bitter. Far too many who profess the name of Christ spend more time obsessing on those who have wronged them than rejoicing in those who have blessed them. Letters and tangible expressions of gratitude are not only pleasing to Christ, but an antidote to heart-sickness.

To read the third point and the whole article, click here.

Happy New Year!