Yesterday in church, Matt Jones shared about his role as a parent in the lives of his children. Specifically, Matt was alluding to his job (along with his wife, Cara) as the chief source of spiritual development for his children. While he appreciates the role of the church (particularly its programs), he does not “outsource” […]
I came across this series of letters to parents the other day and found them insightful and helpful. Here is letter #4: Dear Parents, You attend church, and all of us that work to prepare exciting environments for your children are thrilled that you do. It’s obvious to us that you value what the Body […]
I came across this series of letters to parents the other day and found them insightful and helpful. Here is letter #3: Dear Parents, You love your kid. That much is obvious by your willingness to set rules and then hold your children to obedience to those rules. As a pastor to children, I commend […]
I came across this series of letters to parents the other day and found them insightful and helpful. Here is letter #2: Dear Parents, Thank you so much for coming to church this weekend. It was a thrill to see you and your entire family worshipping with the rest of your church family. I know […]
I came across this series of letters to parents the other day and found them insightful and helpful. Here is letter #1: Dear Parents, Thank you for coming to church…last month. Where ya been? I love seeing you and your family, but it’s been a while. Don’t lie about how much you attend, because nowadays […]
Gossip and rumors move a little differently today than they did when I was in middle school and high school. It might take a rumor a couple of days to circulate throughout the school, and gossip lasted a while. When the subject of a rumor got home, they were largely insulated from the effects of […]
About this talk: Child prodigy Adora Svitak says the world needs “childish” thinking: bold ideas, wild creativity and especially optimism. Kids’ big dreams deserve high expectations, she says, starting with grownups’ willingness to learn from children as much as to teach. source TED
In our increasingly safety-conscious and bubble-wrapped world, this presenter defies the mainstream. Think about it: as you watch the video above, don’t you find it offensive and wrong at times? I mean, giving a kid a knife to play with?! Fire?! A spear?! What kind of a parent would do such a thing? Gever Tully […]
Once upon a time there was a young, misbehaving princess who was taken away from her royal parents by magic. Actually, she was taken by a person of magic: The Wise Woman. Through a wild set of circumstances, Rosamond (the young misbehaving princess) found herself in a meager, common home in a faraway country side, […]
There was a sermon that I preached a couple of years ago called “Watching You: Stewarding the Rising Generation.” I wrote kind of a plea at the end of that message that bears repeating: There is so much more that I could and want to say about this subject. So many more specific things that […]
Sam Luce wrote a great post on the “why” of discipline versus the “what” of discipline. You can read the post here or below: I don’t want to go down the road of what type of disciple you should do for your kids because every kid is different and every family is different. What I […]
I came across this incredibly encouraging article the other day about parenting. It’s been my experience as a parent that this job is equal parts overwhelming, daunting, frustrating, fulfilling, dramatic, enjoyable, and a plethora of other adjectives that fail me at the moment. Reading this article validated some of my feelings and gave me some […]
I’ve been thinking about these kinds of things a lot lately: I just read this article about a mom who decided that she and her 3 teenagers were going to take a 6 month break from technology. ”My concern,” she says, “was that we had ceased to function as a family. We were just a […]
This is important for me; both as a parent and as a husband. Prior to both (marriage and kids), my life was ordered, controlled (for the most part) by me. I managed myself and my things. When I left my keys on the desk, I knew the keys would be there the next time I […]
This picture is from PostSecret.com, where people, you know, post secrets. I got the idea for this post from Parents | Celebrate Your Kids. As a parent myself, I wondered how I would have responded to seeing this on my garage floor initially. Would I praise and celebrate? (probably not) Would I scold and yell? […]
TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, and Design. In general these talks “bring together the world’s most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives (in 18 minutes).” Let’s Talk Parenting Taboos is talk by Rufus Griscom and Alisa Volkman co-founders of Babble.com that I found fascinating, true, humorous, educational, […]
About 3 years ago, our small group read and studied through the book A Long Obedience in the Same Direction by Eugene Peterson. The book walks the reader through the Psalms of Ascent (Psalm 120-134). While it was a fascinating and impactful study for our group, the title of the book has always stuck with […]
This past Sunday, I shared with the church a little about some math I had done: 24 hours a day x 7 days in a week = 168 total hours in a week minus 8 hours a day for SLEEP x 7 days = 56 hours sleeping per week minus 7 hours a day for […]
Capturing and capitalizing moments when you have a captive, parental audience Chad and Autumn Ward told me this @ reThink. After our meeting and question/answer time, I asked Chad about reThink’s family ministry strategy. I wondered if it was just informing parents about what their children learned during the children’s ministry hour on Sunday morning. […]