If we want to become a teacher, we must submit to sixteen years of schooling. A doctor? Add another four to that, and then tack on an additional two years of residency.
To become a parent, how many years of schooling does it take?
None. Not a class, not a practice session, not even the requirement to do our best.
However, the Bible gives us two things all parents must do if we want to raise our children in the ways of the Lord.
God’s First Requirement:
Jesus’ parents were untrained, unprepared, and, the world might say, unfit to be parents. After all, they weren’t married, and already a little one was on their doorstep.
How many times have we seen children having children, and we cast our condemnation on them? Joseph and Mary were in the same position. Traveling to a distant land while nine months pregnant? Didn’t Mary even bother to crack her prenatal childcare manual? And Joseph, how could he let her take such a risk?
Yet, in Luke 2:27, we read where Jesus’ parents brought him to the Temple. There God’s revelation to Simeon was fulfilled, and a great prophecy was made by Anna over the young Jesus.
When we bring our children to God, God chooses to bless them.
God’s Second Requirement:
Travel during the time of our Lord was very difficult. It meant packing up the household, carrying provisions for the journey, and walking or riding on the back of a beast for days at a time.
It must have been tempting to sleep in on the morning of the journey and miss it altogether.
However, Luke 2:41 tells us Joseph and Mary took Jesus to the feast of the Passover in Jerusalem. Sleeping in? Not for them, and thank God for their dedication, for this was God’s opportunity for Jesus to first reveal his divinity to those in religious authority over the Jews.
When we choose to skip out on Sunday services, what do our children miss out on? Perhaps the one service we choose to miss is the one where God will choose to reveal his majesty and his glory to our children.
We cannot afford to simply sleep in.
We may not have attended the College of Child Upbringing, but we cannot afford for our children to miss the Calling of Christ unto the Cross.
Copyright © 2013 MyChurchNotes.net
Code: FD.FGO.E.27.13c.vp