Weaving a Spiritual Legacy for Your Children
By: Tara McClenahan
One day, quite out of the blue, I looked around and realized how much time had passed since I held my newborn son.
Then I realized something else even more sobering than that:
I wasn’t doing much to make sure he really knew and understood
who God is,
why God created him and
why we are called to honor and serve Him.
Sure, we prayed over our meals and at bedtime, but I had never explained to him why we did that. Neither had I explained to him why we went to church each week or why Mommy reads her Bible to him at night.
It hadn’t occurred to me to make known to him what is so real to me.
These were just the things we did. I simply didn’t think about giving him the “why”. Apparently, I was operating under the assumption that he would pick it up along the way. I felt so foolishly blind and like such a failure!
That’s when I knew I had to become a missionary in my own home.
Today, I am passionate about not letting my son’s spiritual development occur by osmosis, by chance or hoping that he will pick it up along the way. My heart’s desire is to make sure that I don’t look back years from now with regret that I didn’t intentionally make the time to teach my son what is really important.
I don’t want the most important part of his life, his spiritual development, to have a big hole in it because I let the daily grind distract me. I don’t want to use the craziness of life and my fleshly nature as excuses to not be a Godly example.
He needs to see what being a true child of God looks like including all the highs and lows – from obedience and failures to repentance and forgiveness. Most importantly though, I want him to see and come to know God and all that He is.
I’ve always felt immensely blessed to be a parent. Having said that, not every day evokes that feeling. Probably the most humbling part is knowing that, for whatever reason, God chose me to be the parent to this particular life – this running, jumping, adventurous, curious, red-cheeked little boy. He has entrusted the training and nurturing of my son into my hands. If that was where my thinking stopped though, I would be paralyzed from fear and the weight of the responsibility. Wouldn’t you?
God has not left us to parent our children alone. He has given us His Word, His Holy Spirit and His grace. These are not tools in our parenting kit, however.
They ARE the parenting kit!
“All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work.” 2 Timothy 3:16-17 NASB
“But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose it to you.” John 16:13-14 NASB
“Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” Hebrews 4:16 NASB
God has given us what we need to parent our children as he directs us in Deuteronomy 6:6-9. To obediently do this is actually an act of weaving together a spiritual legacy for our children.
A legacy isn’t just something that our children receive once we are gone from this earth. It is also something they acquire every day.
What we teach,
what we say,
how we act (gulp!), and
the example we set, etc.
are all a part of our everyday legacy.
We live it in front of them every single day. Keeping this in mind is vital to helping us stay focused on what we really want them to see in and hear from us and what we want them to know. This can cause us to take that extra deep breath (or two) before correcting our little angels! This can cause us to pause and think before we make a choice about something.
This can (and should) cause us to hit our knees asking for strength, perseverance and guidance every day!
Do we have to be perfect? No.
If we aren’t perfect in this every day (or even every week), will our children turn out to be heathens? Not necessarily. Remember, we do our part – be obedient by the grace of God to raise our children in the ways and words of God – and God will take care of His part.
We will not answer to God for our children’s salvation; we will answer to God for the obedience (or lack thereof) of raising them as He directs us in His Word. To do this, we need to make sure that our lifeline is to God Himself. He made our precious children, entrusted them to our care and will supply everything we need to raise them in His ways. He will not abandon us or leave us to our own devices.
Everything we need is found in Him alone. Run to Him today and everyday, and let Him shape His legacy in you so you can live it out for your children all the days of your life.
Tara McClenahan iBloom and is the honored & humble mommy to “Little Man”. Tara’s program, Mommy Missions is causing a lot of buzz in the Christian mom world! Mommy Missions is designed to help busy yet determined moms to intentionally nurture the spiritual development of their children in little ways every day.
Tara’s passion is to inspire, encourage and equip Christian moms to become “Proverbs 31 mamas” and to train their children according to the Bible.
Tara’s writings and teachings have been featured on iBloom, Heart of the Matter, Seeds of Faith, Cindy Rushton’s Time for Tea, the Ultimate Women’s Expo and the Ultimate Homeschool Expo. She can be reached at [email protected].
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Thank you so much for sharing your heart and your ministry with us today Tara! I just love what God is doing in and through you and can not wait to watch lives being changed from the seed He’s giving you to share with so many mama’s!
I absolutely love watching what God is doing in the lives of Real Women…that’s the heart of the Godly Gals series…Real Women, Real Life, Real Faith in action!
If you have something you’d like to share with us, then send me an email at melsworldministry {at} gmail {dot} com and I’ll send you a copy of the submission guidelines.
I’d love to hear from you!
