Motivating Our Kids to Church When They’re Throwing a Fit

Motivating Our Kids to Church When They’re Throwing a Fit

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We had a plan, and it was beau­ti­ful: wake up ear­ly East­er morn­ing, get dressed and ready before the kids were up. Sip some cof­fee. And then wake up the three kids ages 5 and under, throw on their East­er out­fits and shuf­fle them out the door (with a donut in their bel­lies) for the ear­ly ser­vice. The ear­ly ser­vice! We were going to make it, on time, and noth­ing could stop us. Except, per­haps, the kinder­garten­er hav­ing a melt­down about going…

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Childhood Should Be Training for Adulthood, Not a Test Drive

Childhood Should Be Training for Adulthood, Not a Test Drive

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There’s a dis­tinct dif­fer­ence between a test dri­ve and train­ing. Imag­ine walk­ing out of the deal­er­ship with keys for a new car you’re con­sid­er­ing buy­ing. You climb in, adjust the seat and mir­rors, fid­dle with a few of the knobs and then take the car out. It’s not your car yet — you haven’t made a com­mit­ment to own­er­ship — but you want to know if this car is right for you. So you put it through its paces. Free­way, city…

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A Parent’s Heart Leans on Marriage

A Parent’s Heart Leans on Marriage

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Par­ent­ing and mar­riage were designed togeth­er. God’s gen­tle com­mand to the first mar­ried cou­ple was sim­ply, “Be fruit­ful and mul­ti­ply.” “Don’t mere­ly have chil­dren,” God says, “but have chil­dren that grow and pros­per and have chil­dren of their own — fill the earth with your fam­i­ly. Your mar­riage is a gift — so par­ent well!” God envi­sions par­ent­ing as a nat­u­ral bi-pro­duct of mar­riage, an exten­sion of that rela­tion­ship. But far too often we blur the lines between our roles as hus­band and father, moth­er…

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Flint Knives, Strange Passages, and the Judicious Parent’s Heart

Flint Knives, Strange Passages, and the Judicious Parent’s Heart

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One of the strangest pas­sages in the Bible is Exo­dus 4:24–26. A quick sum­ma­ry: Moses was just com­mis­sioned by God to save the Israelites, so nat­u­ral­ly, God meets Moses at an inn and “seeks to kill him.” Upon see­ing her husband’s plight, Moses’ wife Zip­po­rah does what we would all do: grabs a flint knife, cir­cum­cis­es their son and touch­es Moses feet with the bloody fore­skin. Duh. Prob­lem solved, and the sto­ry moves on. … ? Despite being absurd­ly straight­for­ward, this…

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The Heart of the Parent Takes Responsibility

The Heart of the Parent Takes Responsibility

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The sto­ry of Noah is one of the most dis­heart­en­ing and cul­tur­al­ly rel­e­vant exam­ples of par­ent­ing in the Bible. In Gene­ses 6–8, Noah and his fam­i­ly are divine­ly cho­sen and spared while God wipes out every sem­blance of cul­ture from the face of the earth. When his fam­i­ly final­ly lands on Mt. Ararat, the only liv­ing things set­ting foot on the earth were those pre­served over the pre­vi­ous half a year in the ark. Imag­ine, as a par­ent, walk­ing into a cul­tur­al­ly clut­ter free envi­ron­ment as…

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