• Jan. 28, 2009
Hello Again!

Yes, I know I have been neglecting this blog. I apologize to all who read it - all 2 of you!  JK!  Really, the holidays are just so crazy around here.  Enough excuses, I have vowed to try to do better in 2009.  We had a wonderful Christmas season.  Truly blessed in so many ways.  The kids really got excited about the gold, frankencense and myrh presents.  I even had color coordinated wrapping paper so they could tell which category each present was before it was opened.  Obviously gold paper was for the "gold" presents, then red paper was myrh, and blue paper was frankencense.  It was a lot of fun, and I know it helped keep their focus on the true meaning of Christmas.

     Psalm 127: 3-5  "Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward.  Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one's youth.  Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them!"

My pastor read this passage on Sunday, and commented on how we as parents (the warriors) need to point our children toward the target.  The more I thought about that concept, the more I realized that it speaks so profoundly to homeschool parents.  The verse calls the parents WARRIORS.  They are not just archers, or someone who shoots the arrows for sport.  They are in a battle.  We know that there truly is a battle for our children's souls.  We need to take it seriously - in a battle there is danger, and loss of life sometimes.  But when there is a victory, there is freedom.  Warriors need training.  They don't just go out there in the midst of the battle and hope for the best!  We, as parents, need training and instruction as well on how to accurately point those arrows at the target. Where do we get that training?  The Bible.  I always get a bit annoyed when people say babies aren't born with instruction manuals.  They are!  I am convinced that everything we need to know about godly parenting is in God's word. (Not that I've discovered or implemented it all yet...)  God's word will change their hearts and minds, and continually point them back toward that target when it goes off course.  We, as parents, need to make SURE we are filling ourselves with the Word, so it flows out of us.  You cannot get water from a dry well, so we cannot expect them to see the Lord in us, if we don't take the time to constantly fill ourselves with the Word.  So often it seems like that becomes one more "thing" we have to get done in a very busy day.  I pray that we remember that our time in the Word is so important to our parenting that it's Okay if other "things" don't get done.

     Later in the service, the pastor began his sermon on Revelation chapter 2, about the church in Ephesus.  This really had no connection to the earlier Scripture reading, but since I was still pondering the warrior/arrow/homeschool/parenting concept, this sermon started to take on that meaning as well.  In Rev. 2, the Lord is talking to this specific church, and he commends their works for Him.  He compliments their TOIL and their labor, and patient endurance.  He does not confront them on their "busy-ness".  What he does confront them on is their lovelessness.  He says they have forsaken, or abandoned, the love they had at first.  This reminds me of the passage in Corinthians where we learn that that if we do things without love, we are nothing.  The works themselves are good perhaps, but what is truly needed is LOVE behind them.  Remember when you were first in love with your spouse?  You wanted to be with that person ALL the time, and serve that person in whatever way you could.  Remember when you were first saved?  Your passion for the Lord was so strong.  Sometimes you barely got to requests in prayers, because you were so full of praise!  Remember when your children were newborns?  You were totally in love with them and wanted to hold them and kiss them ALL day long, and every little thing they did was so adorable.  Well, in Rev. 2, God tells this church to repent and GO BACK and do the works they did at first.  That is His instruction on how to get the "love" back in their works.  We can take this and apply it to our homeschool parenting as well.  We are often so busy with the "works" of homeschooling that we may be forgetting the "love" part.  And that's our reason for homeschooling in the first place.  We need to remember to actively LOVE ON our kids all day long, through the schooling and frustrations and all the other stuff.  If we do it without love, it is like any other work done without love.  It is so easy to become weary, and get bogged down in the small stuff.  So today, let us pray that we will do all things with LOVE.

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