Then, at our Thanksgiving meal, we opened the jar and read through all the notes from the past year. While I was semi-annoyed by the project overall, I remember sitting at the Thanksgiving table that year thinking it was pretty cool to be reminded of all the specific things we were thankful for. It was much more than the generic family, friends, and food we were usually talked about at Thanksgiving.

As lame as I felt that exercise was throughout the year, I think it was that year when Thanksgiving shifted from being about a meal with relatives to being about a time to remember what we’re thankful for.

Ideas That Shape Our Children’s Faith

We all can probably think back to experiences as kids that shifted our perspective on relationships, faith, ourselves, and traditions. That’s why I picked up Timothy Smith’s book, “52 Creative Family Time Experiences: Fun Ways To Bring Faith Home,” because I want to be intentional about creating those experiences for my kids, too.

How It Works

The book outlines 52 teaching experiences you can re-create for your family, mostly geared toward children between 6-11 years old with suggested modifications for both younger children and teens. Each experience requires a little bit of preparation and lasts anywhere from 10-30 minutes making it pretty easy for a weekly family get-together. I especially like that the experiences are intentionally geared for various learning styles and focus on utilizing touch, sight, sound, hearing, smell, and taste.

Each experience starts with an opener of some kind, leads into a scripture passage, shifts to a few discussion questions, and culminates in an activity that illustrates and reenforces the main point of the passage.

Will It Work?

Will I use this book with my family? I’m not sure yet. At 2 and 3 years old, my children are still a bit young for this book, but I imagine I’ll use it for reference and ideas as they grow older even if I don’t go through the book word for word.

The hesitation for me going through the book as it’s written is that each of the experiences seem to revolve around a good moral value we all want our kids to learn. For example, some main points listed are, “Sometimes our selfishness causes fights,” and, “Healthy families are truthful.” Obviously I’m not opposed to them learning these good moral values and others, but the approach of the experiences in this book triggers my “behavior modification” flag. It feels like we’re starting with the behavior we want to address, finding scripture to support it, and using it with an activity to reinforce the rule.

I realize that whether or not this is communicated to the kids will depend a lot on how the parents present and lead their family through the experiences, but as a general rule of thumb, when I teach scripture to my kids I prefer not to use scripture as a rule book to support the rules and principles I put in place for them. I sense this could lead to a view of scripture that lends itself to being a restrictive “kill joy.” Instead, I’d rather teach my kids the story of scripture — that our story starts with creation and culminates in a re-created earth in Revelation 21-22 — and that we live with our sights and hope set on that coming city, not on a list of dos and don’ts as outlined by daddy and backed up with scripture.

I don’t know. Maybe this is the perspective of a nieve and inexperienced father, too, which I know I certainly am. I’d love to hear in the comments below any input you guys may have for me in how I teach my children and create experiences that will shape their faith.

QUESTION: How do you create experiences to shape your kids’ faith?

Maybe I’m a little cynical after the 2012 elections and all the Facebook, “Christ is still King,” posts and the bad wrap a lot of angry people were giving Christians, but surfing Facebook today I saw the first, “I’m keeping Christ in Christmas,” picture, which made me wonder, “How? How are you keeping Christ the main focus of Christmas instead of all the decorations, presents, parties, and travel plans?”

What My Daughter Learned About Christmas From Me

I noticed I created an issue with my children. I was out shopping with our 3 year old and everything she wanted she said she wanted for Christmas. It didn’t take me long to realize that for a few months I had used the excuse, “Maybe you’ll get that for Christmas,” as my cop-out to not buying her anything she wanted. Instead, of telling her about budgeting and money like I should have, it was just easier to keep her hopes up. I should have been straight forward and told her she couldn’t have whatever toy or clothing she wanted at the moment.

And so now, I am trying to figure out how to retrain our 3 year old from this consumer mindset she has already picked up about Christmas because of the words I have told her.

And I struggle with this, too. I would love to buy a lot of things for my family this Christmas. Just last week I almost bought outfits for the kids so they could have another Christmas gift. I justified it in my head by telling myself it was clothing and not toys, but in reality I just really wanted to get it so they had another gift to open. That’s not what I want them to think Christmas is all about.

What I’m Trying To Teach Her Instead

Last year I found a book called, “The Adventure of Christmas: Helping Children Find Jesus in Our Holiday Traditions,” that has lessons about the meaning behind the different traditions we do for Christmas. For example, there are children lessons about the advent wreath, advent calendar, sending Christmas cards, putting lights on the tree, baking cookies, and more. With our kids being 1 and 2 years old last year I didn’t bother to teach them the different traditions, but now that they are 2 and 3 years old, and our kids are able to understand a lot more this year. I think it’s time to pull the book out and prepare for the advent season and teach them the reason why we celebrate.

I’m sure each year will be a learning process as the kids get older and are exposed more to the consumer mindset of Christmas (hopefully without my help next year!). We’ll try to find new ways for them to understand the “Why?” behind Christmas, not the, “Wants.”

QUESTION: How do you help your kids keep the focus of Christmas on Christ despite the distractions?

God’s Story

Some stories we’re very intentional about sharing with our children, such as God’s Story. We want them to grow up believing that they are born as a slave to a curse, that a King not only paid the ultimate price to buy them out of slavery, but also adopted them as sons and daughters will all the rights, privileges, and access to the Father that comes along with that adoption. We want them to believe that this King gave us a part of Himself in the form of the Holy Spirit as a taste of what is to come when He returns to setup His rule with us in a new Kingdom. We want them to go through life deeply believing that story, so much so that they place their hope in that Kingdom and live their lives for it’s fulfillment.

The American Dream Story

That means there are some conflicting stories that we don’t yet want to expose our kids to, such as the American Dream story that believes life is supposed to start off great and only get better: get a good education, a stable job, a great marriage, a nice house, and comfortable retirement. While there is nothing inherently wrong with these things, that’s not the story I want my kids to place their hope in. I don’t want them to have such a short-sighted view of eternity.

The American Romance Story

While watching a few Disney movies with Hannah, another story Dana and I have decided to moderate is the American romance story. They’re often innocent, cute movies that Dana and I enjoy, but we realized that Hannah started believing those stories just because she had no other story to compare it to. As far as she knew, girls are supposed to be smart, guys are supposed to be dumb, and the guy may not ultimately have the girl’s best interest in mind.

Instead, we decided we want Hannah to fall in love with our romance story. While watching our wedding DVD with her, we answer her many questions. We tell her the story of how mommy and daddy met and married. As she gets older we’ll fill in more of the details for her, both the things we did right and the things we did wrong.

The Story We Live

But of all the stories we tell our children, I was reminded last week that the most life-shaping story of all is the story Dana and I live in front of them.

Before we left for Haiti, I told Hannah why we were leaving her and Zeke behind. I told her about children who have no mommy and daddy, no toys, and no home. I told her about people who do not have food nor clean water and that we were going to go help those people and talk with them about Jesus. I could tell Hannah developed a sense of pride in her mommy and daddy, almost like her contribution to our trip was giving her mommy and daddy away to other people for a week. The result? We returned home from Haiti to hear stories of how Hannah and Zeke played, “Going to Haiti.” They pretended to go help people in need, just like mommy and daddy. I think they caught that story! Now we’re reinforcing that story with all our pictures and videos from Haiti.

Stories are powerful. We all believe stories. I want to shape which stories my kids believe so when they’re faced with conflicting stories from the world they can make a clear choice of which story they want to believe. I pray they choose to believe God’s story.

QUESTION: How have you seen stories influence your children?

So why, after all that time, did I never think to put the same energy toward doing the same for my family? I know how critical it is for a church community to have a vision and direction, so why not my family, too?

A while ago my boss at Epipheo said this,

“If you do not cast a vision for your family, your children will be captivated by a lesser one.”

And it’s so true!

In one sense, casting a vision for my family sounds easy: “Oh, my vision is for my kids to grow up to be fully-devoted followers of Christ.” But what does that even mean? And is that really a clear vision or something I just hope will happen?

Don’t get me wrong: I haven’t completely ignored spiritually with my kids. I mean, I read Bible stories with them, we pray together, thank God for things, stuff like that. But if I’m really honest with myself, it’s mostly because I want my kids grow up to avoid poor choices and the consequences that sinful behaviors can bring. It really hasn’t been about them growing up to make uncomfortable, life-changing choices for the Kingdom nor full dependency on Christ.

The question I ask below isn’t one that I can fully answer right now, but I’m working on it. My wife and I are dreaming, “Lord, what is your specific vision for our family? And how do we disciple our kids specifically to fulfill that?”

QUESTION: What’s your vision for your family? Do you have a discipleship plan for them based on it?

Through this weekend only, Dave Ramsey is offering a free kids audiobook download! No need to part with personal information, sign up for email lists, or anything like that. Just a plain and simple free mp3 audiobook download of one of their kids books.

This freebie reminds me that I need to teach my kids to be financially responsible. They’re only 1 and 2 years old, so I probably don’t need to focus on that quite yet other than developing good financial habits myself to model and pass along to them when they get older.

In The Super Red Racer, Junior learns about earning money to buy a new bike. All of our kid’s items are fun, entertaining, and teach important life lessons.

It’s only free for a few days, so snag it if you’re interested.

We actually visited Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace Plaza about two weeks ago and watched his radio show live. We met him and talked for a bit, as well. Here’s our vlog of that trip if you’re interested in a “behind the scenes” look of The Dave Ramsey Show.

QUESTION: How do you teach financial responsibility to your children?

Our two-year-old loves to lead us in prayer now, and it’s so cute because she goes on and on and on and on…

But I’ve noticed that her prayers all revolve around either thanking God for things or asking Him to essentially keep us safe and make us comfortable. She doesn’t say it like that, but that’s what it boils down to.

And then it hit me: that’s what she’s learning about prayer from listening to me pray. Whenever we pray together I say things like,

• Help us to have good dreams and fall right to sleep.
• Keep us safe while we drive.
• Bless this food to make us strong and healthy.
• Help Hannah’s tummy to feel better soon.

Essentially, “Make my life better and remove discomforts.”

Praying for these things is not bad, of course, and most of them probably have equivalent examples in scripture. But overall, what if my children grew up praying for deeper things?

• Help me to understand your Word better.
• Make me a mighty woman of prayer.
• Give me the courage to talk about you with the people around me.
• Give me the wisdom to make tough decisions that are honoring to you.

If I want my kids to grow up with this kind of perspective on prayer, then I need to be setting the example and praying it in front of them regularly because what they learn about prayer during these formative years will be a result of mine and Dana’s personal prayer life modeled in front of them.

No pressure or anything!

QUESTION: How do you model a prayer life that you want your kids to adopt?

While driving, I noticed that Hannah, our two year old, was reciting almost every Dora episode word for word. I thought, “Wow, if she can do that, she’s definitely ready to start memorizing scripture.” But then I thought, “But where do I start with a two year old?”

When I was growing up, my parents made me and my siblings memorize a sheet of scripture verses every Friday before lunch. Although I hated it at the time, both my personal walk with the Lord and my ministry benefit more from all the scripture I memorized than almost anything else. I still use it almost every day, and I’d love for my children to grow up with the same spiritual foundation of memorizing the Word of God.

But honestly, I don’t know where to start. My parents took a topical approach with us, which was fine for us at the time because we were around 10 to 12 years old, but most of the words in those verses are words that my daughter wouldn’t even understand, let along comprehend what she was saying. Or is it even necessary that she understands it? She certainly doesn’t understand everything Dora is saying, especially in Spanish.

QUESTION: Where’s the best place to start with a 2-year-old in memorizing scripture?

There’s more details about the conference on their blog post here that also includes the speaker schedule, dates, and times everything is taking place. Just remember to register beforehand (it’s free!) and then you can watch the event live on their streaming page.

Check it out and let us know what you think!

Every Sunday we wake up a bit earlier than usual and I tell our kids, “Hey, it’s time to get ready to go to church!” It’s innocent enough, but to Hannah, our two year old, I’m reinforcing the fact that church is a building we attend once or twice a week. Although we all know that’s not an entirely accurate understanding of ecclesia, it’s what she’s learning from me. But what else do I say? How else do I teach her from a young age that church isn’t just a building we attend — it’s a body of believers, a group of people who are “called out?” Should I even bother with that at this age?

The second thing I noticed I’m teaching Hannah about church, though, is even more unhelpful. Every Sunday after church I find myself asking her, “Hannah, did you have fun at church today?” Out of all the things I could ask her and “debrief” about our time at church, why do I default to asking her about fun?! Why would I reinforce to her that the main thing I’m interested in hearing about is if she had fun or not? I certainly do not want her growing up thinking that church is primarily supposed to be an entertaining place.

Inside, I think the question stems from a heart that just wants her time at church to be a positive experience, but I’m not sure that I’m asking questions that help her understand even from a young age that church isn’t primarily about having fun nor having a nursery staff that makes sure she enjoys herself.

And when she gets older, will that expectation then transfer to youth pastors?

Of course, I could ask her perhaps a better question like, “Hannah, what did you learn at church today?” but will that teach her that church is primarily a place where we’re supposed to learn about God? What happens if that mentality sticks with her into adulthood and she gets to a place where she’s not learning much at church anymore? Will she be that person who leaves a church because, “I’m just not learning or growing here,” as if individual spiritual growth is the church’s responsibility?

QUESTION: I think I might be over-analyzing this, but I don’t know. What do you guys think?

“Our biggest struggle is the resentment we feel when you’re seemingly showing others more attention than us?”

No one in ministry thinks to themselves, “Ya know, I prefer to build resentment in my family while serving others.”

Usually one of two things happen.

One, we start down a slow process of one small step at a time in the wrong direction until one day we look up and wonder, “How did we get here?”

Or two, we think we’re doing great with the time we’re investing into our family, but our family feels otherwise, usually because we’re investing our time into the wrong things with them. Maybe we look at the clock and think, “Wow, I spent 5 hours at home today with the kids! Awesome! They must really feel loved!” when really all your little girl wanted was for you to show up at her soccer game.

I’ve told the story before, so I won’t repeat it again, but I personally know how this feels growing up as a pastor’s kid. Thankfully, when I confronted my dad during my senior year of high school, he immediately had someone else take over the Bible study and started coming to all my wrestling matches. He did the same for my brothers and sisters after that. He honestly just had no idea how I felt. As far as he was concerned, he worked from the church office in our home and spent many hours with us every day. We had plenty of attention, just not always when it was important to us.

Don’t assume the hours you invest into your family are always invested at the right times. Ask them.

QUESTION: What are some of the best times your family has spent together? What do each of those experiences have in common? How can you replicate it often?