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Who am I?

A child’s quest to understand his or her own identity will always be filtered through his or her understanding of what it means to be your child. As your child, they are part of something bigger than themselves. They are a member of a family. This comes with rights and privileges, like access to you, your love, resources, and support. It comes with heritage and community, with grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, siblings, and family friends. It also comes with responsibilities like obeying you, following the rules of your household, doing chores, etc. 

Your family values, whether spoken or unspoken, are ingrained in your children at an early age. When they hear of God’s invitation to join His family, these filters will come into play. As you begin to point them toward the target of a living faith, help them to see both the similarities and the differences of becoming a member of God’s family. 

Use your parenting flaws as an opportunity to show how God forgives us and to explain how His parenting is always perfect, even when we’re not. Don’t be afraid to ask your children for forgiveness for the ways you’ve sinned against them.

There are several lessons in this. First, as a child of God, they will have forgiveness for their sins and the righteousness of Christ imparted on them. Second, they learn firsthand how to extend forgiveness to others. Your confession exemplifies the unconditional love they are to show their neighbors when they become members of the family of faith, the church, and part of a larger community. 

When they join the family of God, they will also have new responsibilities, like obeying God and following His path for their lives.

No two children were created to follow the exact same path. As they grow and mature, study their specific abilities, passions, and personalities. Then help each child to discover how they can individually honor God by using their unique gifts.

Often, God designs our children to fulfill a much different role in life than us. It can be difficult when God’s path doesn’t match our expectations. But we must be careful not to interfere with His plan. Our children will always do better living according to God’s plan for their lives than they will living for ours.

Our children were created for a purpose, and it’s our goal as parents to help them discover what that purpose is.

Pray: Lord, thank You for Your invitation to be adopted into Your family. Give me wisdom as I guide my child to consider Your invitation and one day accept it. 

For more help read, “5 Ways to Help Your Child Develop a Growing Relationship With Christ” on FamilyLife.com.