How To Be An Effective Parent In A Defective World

Packed with practical advice, this series will give struggling parents a vision for their children's future and life-changing help for today. s parents, our challenge today is this: We must find a way to navigate our children through the landmines of change, moral relativism, drugs, alcohol, peer pressure, sexual immorality, and still raise them to be godly people.

There's a saying that goes something like: "If you don't know what you're aiming for, you'll hit it every time." The same is true for raising our kids.So the question that we as parents should be asking ourselves is: "What am I trying to accomplish?" God gives us His ultimate goal for our children: Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.

Building strong bonds, and disciplining effectively will help parents bringing up Christ-centered kids who feel secure and significant no matter what comes their way. Parenting today is tough and often confusing. I know that from personal experience. I don't know what unique challenges your family faces.Will we fail sometimes? Of course.

We went through seasons of rebellion and times when we sat up in bed and cried in frustration because we had no idea what to do in this parenting journey-just like many of you have. Many parents live in survival mode while trying to raise basically good-hearted kids who, in spite of their life-shattering mistakes, really mean no harm. People watched this sitcom because they could relate. It's crude humor and dysfunctional relationships played out in prime time what was actually occurring in real-time.

Scared of what might happen, many of us become preoccupied with what we don't want our children to do. "I don't want them to get hooked on drugs" or "I don't want them to suffer the consequences of illicit sex." That's fear, and it leads to a defensive, tentative, and often overprotective approach to life. Not only is that counterproductive, it requires more effort than we can give; if carried to the extreme, it demands our being with them every- 2 effective parenting in a defective world where they go.

Mistrust often becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. We need God's perspective on our kids. Proactive parenting requires a target. That's how effective parenting begins: with positive, clear-cut objectives. What are you trying to accomplish with your children? Do you have a clear target?

It's really hard to resist this current of our culture; resistance requires an intentional and persistent effort, especially when your kids try to convince you that you're persecuting them by going against the grain. Examine society's picture of parenthood carefully. It tries to convince us that the target of a good parent is to ensure their children have highly developed athletic prowess, refined social skills, and the best and most prestigious education, all of which should lead to greater upward mobility in life with greater opportunities and, of course, greater happiness.

And the pressure's on, because if we fail at any of these points-if we don't work hard enough to earn enough money and rearrange our schedules to make enough time-we (and others) might feel as if we've done a bad job as parents. You can't hit the target until you know what the target looks like.

Bring our kids up in the training and instruction of the Lord. God warns us against overcorrecting our children and against placing demands on them that will be counterproductive. But discipline can really only be implemented from within the home.

Parents who really care about the welfare of their kids need to guard against effective parenting in a defective world.

As parents, we need to have a clear idea of what's most important in raising our kids in the Christian teaching and discipline and on helping our children grow big and strong.


 By Rosemarie Sumalinog Gonzales


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