This parenting blog is a support to other parents who are also striving to raise godly kids in a crazy mixed-up world. You can sign up for weeklyish Premeditated Parenting e-mails by using the link below.

Saturday, November 18, 2006

81: 007 vs. Jesus

As a freshman in college I joined a “life group” from my church. Growing up in a Christian home I was familiar with Sunday school, youth group, and Bible studies, but somehow a small group was intrinsically different. These people didn’t just meet together to learn. Instead, they met together for the sake of being together—to live Christianity together—to be a family. This involved a more intimate level of Christian relationship than I had experienced before. As an awkward teenager trying to develop friendships, I welcomed this fresh approach to Christianity. However, we all bring our quirks and idiosyncrasy into our relationships, and at times I wanted to move on to relationships that were more natural for me. It’s hard to love people!

I remember talking with another guy after small group one night. We were discussing James Bond and just when we were on the verge of some quality male bonding, one of the young ladies (I think her name was Sarah) came over and said, in a very perturbed and offended tone, “You don’t watch that garbage do you? That is so sexist!”

I bantered with some clever come-back like, “Yeah, so?” and then the conversation quickly died. Deep inside I was offended. Feminist! Wet blanket! Fun hater! Goodie-two-shoes! Sure James Bond was a little out there, but he is after all, James Bond. That’s something girls can’t understand. He has a license to be a little out there. He’s doing it all for the country.

I still remember the first time my brother told me about 007. Spies. Women. Danger. I immediately was drawn to the series with a wonder lust. I watched every movie. I read all the books. I even named my slingshot after his gun. To me, James Bond was the epitome of what it meant to be a guy—what it meant to be American (Yes, I know he’s British, but my teenage mind never did accept that.)

Of course, after I stewed on the incident for a few years I realized that Sarah had a point. In fact she probably had a lot of points that she was too exasperated to share with me. James Bond was a womanizer. He had a use-them-and-lose-them mentality. He was a man caught up in all that this world has to offer, and in a make-believe Hollywood fashion he never reaped the fruit of his indiscretions. As a Christian, as much as I tried, I could not defend my actions in continuing to watch shows that glamorized such exceedingly out of bounds immoral actions and attitudes.

I must confess, that with the hype of the new Bond movie coming out, every ounce of my flesh still wants to go see it. In fact, part of me even wants my kids to see it, because it is still such a fond part of my childhood memories.

It’s times like these that battles are won or lost with our kids. I can choose what I want in the flesh, or I can do what is right. I can downplay the godlessness, or I can hold to a high standard with myself, and with my family. Is there anything in your life where you are setting a bad example for your family by not following the standards that God would have for you and your home?

Galatians 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Wednesday, November 01, 2006

80: Quotes from The Duties of Parents by J.C. Ryle

I recently read a booklet by J.C. Ryle called The Duties of Parents. It was first printed in 1888, so it can be a touch more cerebral than we are used to in most modern writing. However, it also has a wealth of wisdom that our society has somehow misplaced in the last 120 years.

Since the copyright is expired, I’ll put the whole work online, but I thought I’d share with you a few of the gems I enjoyed:

“Men can see the faults of their neighbors more clearly than their own.”

“Few are to be found, even among grown-up people, who are not more easy to draw than to drive…We are like young horses in the hand of a breaker: handle them kindly, and make much of them, and by and by you may guide them with a thread.”

“Just so you must set before your children their duty—command, threaten, punish, reason—but if affection be wanting in your treatment, your labor will be in vain.”

In regards to the Bible: “They cannot be acquainted with that blessed book too soon, or too well.”

“Tell them of sin, its guilt, its consequences, its power, its vileness: you will find they can comprehend something of this.”

“Surely if there be any habit which your own hand and eye should help in forming, it is the habit of prayer.”

“If you train your children to anything, train them, at least, to a habit of prayer.”

“See to it too, if it can be so arranged, that your children go with you to church, and sit near you when they are there. To go to church is one thing, but to behave well at church is quite another. And believe me, there is no security for good behavior like that of having them under your own eye.”

“Teach them to feel that what they know not now, they will probably know hereafter, and to be satisfied there is a reason and a needs-be for everything you require them to do.”

“Tell your children, too, that we must all be learners in our beginnings, that there is an alphabet to be mastered in every kind of knowledge, that the best horse in the world had need once to be broken, that a day will come when they will see the wisdom of all your training. But in the meantime if you say a thing is right, it must be enough for them, they must believe you, and be content.

“Parents, determine to make your children obey you, though it may cost you much trouble, and cost them many tears. Let there be no questioning, and reasoning, and disputing, and delaying, and answering again. When you give them a command, let them see plainly that you will have it done.”

“Little weeds need plucking up as much as any. Leave them alone, and they will soon be great.”

“But if you do not take trouble with your children when they are young, they will give you trouble when they are old. Choose which you prefer.”

“Archbishop Tillotson made a wise remark when he said, ‘To give children good instruction, and a bad example, is but beckoning to them with the head to show them the way to heaven, while we take them by the hand and lead them in the way to hell.’”

“The best of schoolmasters will not imprint on their minds as much as they will pick up at your fireside…What they see has a much stronger effect on their minds than what they are told.”

“Who sins before a child, sins double.”

“You must not think it a strange and unusual thing, that little hearts can be so full of sin.”

“Let me once more press upon you the necessity and importance of using every single means in your power, if you would train children for heaven.”

“I know well that God is a sovereign God, and does all things according to the counsel of His own will. I know that Rehoboam was the son of Solomon, and Manasseh the son of Hezekiah, and that you do not always see godly parents having a godly seed. But I know also that God is a God who works by means, and sure am I, if you make light of such means as I have mentioned, your children are not likely to turn out well.”

You may want to post these on your fridge or bathroom mirror for a while. They contain many great truths on which to meditate.