I have made the decision to focus my blog in a new direction. For a long time I have wrestled with finding a way to communicate with parents in our church and until I find something better, this will be my vehicle of choice. Here's why-
I believe my role as Children's Pastor is incomplete and ineffective if all I do is focus on kids for 1 hour a week. Do the math- parents have influence 167 hours/week and I have 1. Now I know our staff is good but that just doesn't add up. And in case you were wondering, the Bible clearly places the responsibility for a child's spiritual development on the parent (Deut.6), not the church.
So for my ministry to be effective, I have to equip parents to do a good job of leading their children to follow Christ and live with the Bible as their life map. This blog will now focus on that task.
That being said, let me add that I do not claim to be a parenting expert. There are plenty of them out there and I will certainly draw on the expertise of many of them. AND, there are a myriad of parenting styles so I'm not going to advocate strictly for one to the exclusion of the others. I simply want to place some tools in your hands so you can be better prepared to be the parent God has called you to be.
Having raised 4 kids into adulthood myself, I know how challenging a job it can be and while I am proud of my kids, they will readily tell you how imperfect my parenting skills were. Its tough because we're dealing with people, not scientific formulas, and there are no easy 10-step programs that will guarantee success. But we do have the Bible to guide us and the benefit of many knowledgeable resources so we can have reasonable expectations that this can be done effectively.
So feel free to dialogue back with me if you want. I'm making the commitment to post a parenting blog every week. If you find it helpful, refer your friends to it and we'll try to help as many people as possible.
