Wonder, Discovery and Passion

Dump finished a three week study on “Think Orange”. Lucia is using this strategy to partner with families. The goal is for us and our children to grow in our relationship with God through “wonder, discovery and passion”.

• During the past three weeks, what has God been saying to you through these messages?

Let’s look back at each of these stages of faith –
Wonder – “I am created to pursue an authentic relationship with my Creator.”
Discovery – “I belong to Jesus Christ and define who I am by what He says”
Passion – “I exist everyday to demonstrate God’s love to a broken world”

As you think through these stages in your life –
• What is God doing in your life?
• Is your loyalty to God because of what He is doing now or what He did years ago but nothing has changed since then?

These are tough questions – because it forces us to be real with ourselves. But as we discussed in the previous weeks – When our children see us dealing with these questions and how God works through them – this serves as a model which the Holy Spirit uses to reach out to them.
You don’t (and you won’t) have to be a perfect parent – Our job is to work out our faith (Phil 2:12) in doing what He desires us to do. By doing this, our kids have a front row seat to the grace and goodness of God.

• Let me rephrase the first question – What does God want you to do now?

The Rhythm of Life as a Believer

We started this week talking about being “wholeheartedly “sold out to God. Then the focus was on teaching this to our children. (Oh, by the way – I do not think there is an age limit to word “children” or a distance limit to where they are – As a Dad of three college kids – I really do appreciate Facebook, and instant messagers).

Let’s look at the verses again cause now God brings the focus back to us….
Deuteronomy 6:4-9 “Listen, O Israel! The LORD is our God, the LORD alone. And you must love the LORD your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your strength. And you must commit yourselves wholeheartedly to these commands that I am giving you today. Repeat them again and again to your children. Talk about them when you are at home and when you are on the road, when you are going to bed and when you are getting up. Tie them to your hands and wear them on your forehead as reminders. Write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

First of all – As I read this and other verses in the Bible – I know God has a sense of humor. He knew some folks would take these verses so literally and walk around with boxes on their hands and foreheads. I bet that was a sight to see…. OH – wait a minute!! We do the same thing today… We have our Christian jewelry, our bumper stickers, our dusty Bibles or Christian knick-knacks.

Do not get me wrong – I do not see any problem with wearing Christian jewelry, having bumper stickers or other Christian theme items in your house or car.. ( Well…. I guess it should be a red flag to you if your Bible is collecting dust). The key word I see in verse eight is “reminder”.

Let me share another verse with you from the New Testament. In Revelation starting with chapter two, God has John writing a letter to the seven churches. Starting with Ephesus, he writes this..

Rev 2:2-5 (NASB) I know your deeds and your toil and perseverance, and that you cannot tolerate evil men, and you put to the test those who call themselves apostles, and they are not, and you found them to be false; and you have perseverance and have endured for My name’s sake, and have not grown weary. But I have this against you, that you have left your first love. Therefore from where you have fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first….

Just like Ephesus, we can get caught up in doing all the Christian things and wearing/displaying all the Christian items – but forget why we are doing, wearing or displaying those items.

The definition of “remind” and “remember” are the same- “to bring to mind or think of again”. That’s the rhythm of life in God – Loving, yielding, surrendering, learning and serving Him who is our Lord and God. Next, we teach, coach, share and model that life to our children and the world around us. And, as we continue and at times get distracted, we need to pause, bring to mind, keep seeking and depend on Him.

Philippians 1:6 “being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you (us) will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”

OK – Marty – So what is the question? – Sorry, sometimes I have to write things out to remind myself – But as always you are welcome to join in

See ya this weekend as we continue to Think Orange –

Teaching about God in the Rhythm of Life

The Israelites are about to enter the land God promised to them but right before they enter – Moses reviews the commands that God had given them. Now in verse seven he brings the topic from a personal commitment to a family commitment. .
Deuteronomy 6:7
“Repeat them again and again to your children. Talk about them when you are at home and when you are on the road, when you are going to bed and when you are getting up”

Did you see the pattern… we should use our daily times as a family to share about who God is and His commands.
1. When we are at home – most of the time in my family the only time we really get together is at mealtimes but this time does provide opportunities to talk about what’s going on in each person’s life and discuss the values God wants us to live by. Sometimes the discussion can be formal teaching and other times it can be a round robin of questions and searching for answers. Instead of letting the TV share its values of the world during our mealtime – turn it off and talk about the day…
2. When you are on the road – I must admit, my wife is better at this than I am. She listens to 106.9 most of the time. As she is driving the kids to school, they get to hear the funny stuff but also the miniature lessons that this radio station is very good at popping in. This allows the kids to talk about what they heard. When you are on the road – there are all kinds of way to have an informal discussion about God. We were taking our second child to college in Kentucky. On one side of the interstate in Tennessee, there is a very large white cross in front a porn shop – This provided us the opportunities to discuss the pro and cons about how that cross was being used.
3. When you are going to bed – We did this more when the kids were little but bedtime is a wonderful time to teach about prayer and read a bedtime story. It becomes an intimate time alone with your child and God.
4. When you are getting up – Well this may work in some homes but in my house ther are five people who love to sleep in and only me who likes to wake up early… But morning is a start of a new day that God has given us. This is a neat time to encourage each other.

Now I did not come up with these ideas on my own… The framework came out of the “Think Orange” book that Dump gave the student leaders.. But as I read through these, I realized that we as a family did a lot of these… and I also saw times that we as parents could have used our time better… Each of these times provide opportunities to teach, have informal discussions, develop close intimate relationships and provide encouragement. We as parents can use these times to be a coach, counselor, friend and teacher.

The main point is that we should do it – find the time, repeat these times over and over again…

OK – what are your thoughts?

What’s the role of Christian parent(s)?

Walk into a bookstore and go down the family aisles and there are more books on parenting than you can imagine. Everyone has a different flavor on how to raise our children. Maybe the reason for so many books is because there is no cookie cutter pattern that works for all families.

In this small group we have parents with adult children, young children, blended families, and a mixture of different ages and numbers in the same family. As mentioned in an earlier post – I came from a broken family with parent’s divorcing more than once. My wife on the other hand, came from a family that stayed together and had many relatives living nearby.

When it came down to how we were going to raise our children – we may have read a couple of those books on the shelves but for the most part it was always a “try and try again” approach with each child. We tell Jonathan (our oldest) that he was our test child on what to do and not to do as parents. But in reality, each child had different personalities and abilities which meant dealing with issues differently at times. The three older kids get on my case because they see me disciplining our youngest different from what they were. (Life with four kids is always fun and challenging!)

When it comes to teaching about God, our role as parents is to live and discuss who God is. Dump has mentioned each weekend that the family spends about 3000 hours a year with our children compared to the church’s 40 hours a year. God knew this and in Deuteronomy He instructed Moses to review the commands that He gave to Israel as they wandered through the wilderness for 40 years.

 Deuteronomy 6:4-8 ( NLT)

4 “Listen, O Israel! The LORD is our God, the LORD alone. 5 And you must love the LORD your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your strength. 6 And you must commit yourselves wholeheartedly to these commands that I am giving you today. 7 Repeat them again and again to your children. Talk about them when you are at home and when you are on the road, when you are going to bed and when you are getting up. 8 Tie them to your hands and wear them on your forehead as reminders. 9 Write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.

(First of all – before we get into what parents , grandparents, relatives should do with our children… I think it is neat how each week that verse 5 has been in our discussion… )

OK – Here’s what we are going to do this week – Instead of asking all the questions at one time, I would like to daily discuss different parts of these verses and how it applies to families…

How committed are you? OK – I know… This is one of those questions that we may not see a lot of comments on but it is one that we need to start thinking about first. Notice the wording the New Living Testament uses, “wholeheartedly”. The other versions say these command shall be on your heart. The point is – following God, trusting God, surrendering to God, has to be a part of your life.

My parents smoked cigarettes, drank beer and other mixed drinks. As I was growing up they would tell me not to do these things, even though they did… When I got on my own, you can probably guess which path I followed.

 Nobody is perfect and we can’t fake being a perfect Christian in front of our kids.. It will not work… But as they watch our lives and see our failures they should also see how we deal with God and how God works through those failures. Take today and tomorrow and  review your own personal commitment to God.

On Wednesday, we will discuss the rhythm God gave us in verse 7 on how to share things about God to our kids.

Yellow – Shining the Light

In Dump’s message – the church is yellow – representing the light of God.  All believers are the church of Christ ( 1 Cor 3:9).   All believers are ministers and ambassadors for God ( 2 Cor. 5:20).  All throughout the Bible are examples of the church (Believers) sharing the light of God to others.

I did not have parents or other family members that pointed me to Christ.  God used people in churches and para-church organizations to lead me to His love.  I was in middle school and my family was falling apart. A couple of students invited me to a student outreach ministry called Youth Ranch.  As my family was torn apart,  God bought me into a group of believers that provided the love and comfort  that I needed.  When I joined a church – God used a choir director and a youth leader to challenge me to dig deeper into God’s word.

My family situation is not an isolated case, unfortunately. This is why God calls us to be the family to people who need a helping hand.

Do you have a story where God used people outside of your family to share the love of Christ?

Influences from the Red

The Bible has more stories about dysfunctional families than examples of good families but there are some that give us a glimpse of  how God worked through parents and relatives…

Joshua was a young lad when Moses sent him and others to spy on the land God promised.  Joshua and Caleb were the only two that brought back a good report and trusted God.  Later towards the end of Joshua’s life he makes this statement – Judge 24: 15 “But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD.”  Joshua was not only the leader of a nation but also a leader in his home.

Another example was Elkanah and Hannah. Hannah was barren and did not have any children.  She asked God for a child and promised that if God would answer her prayer that she would give the child back to the Lord.  She gave birth to Samuel and when he was about two years old, Hannah fulfilled her commitment to God. Look at these verses… – 1 Samuel 1:26-27 “I am the woman who stood here several years ago praying to the Lord. ²⁷ I asked the Lord to give me this boy, and he has granted my request. ²⁸ Now I am giving him to the Lord, and he will belong to the Lord his whole life.” And they^[j] worshiped the Lord there.

One other example is found in the New Testament.  Timothy was a young lad that had a grandmother and mom who set the example for him. Look at how Paul talks about Timothy’s family… 2 Timothy 1:5   –  “I remember your genuine faith, for you share the faith that first filled your grandmother Lois and your mother, Eunice. And I know that same faith continues strong in you.”

As we dive deeper into thinking orange – who are some spiritual mentors in your family?