Repicture Obedience at HomeSample

Obedience begins with listening. This simple, yet crucial step gives purpose to obedience. Listening is an act of love and when a child is trained to listen (and in turn listened to), they develop an identity based on being loved, not by the good works that they do. It bears reiterating if we only focus on the outward picture of obedience, we lose the heart of our children. Training our children to listen to flips that around.

How then do we exactly train to listen? Life as a parent is NOISY. At any given moment, there will be music or TV in the background, arguing, or yelling to just be heard above that noise. But our noisiness goes even deeper than the physical sounds that we hear.

There is the noise of opinions, worry, and everything that is left undone or “not good enough.” Even our escape mechanisms- mindless scrolling through social media or relaxing with a show sometimes adds to the noise rather than release us from the deafening roar. What many of us would define as being busy is actually a problem of noise- everything that loudly screams...

“Do this.”

“Pay attention to me.”

“You forgot this.”

“You are not good enough.”

Noise is an issue because it drowns out the still, small voice of our Heavenly Father. If we can’t hear Him, we can’t do what He says. 

Perhaps the most important lesson of the fourfold process is listening. Why? Listening is a posture of honor. True listening seeks the voice which it loves to hear. Attentive ears hear and heed that voice out of love. Listening forms our identity. Could it be our world is full of so much noise to prevent us from listening to His whispers? If we want our children to obey more, we should train them to listen more. Even more importantly, if we want our children to know who they are in Christ, we should create a space for them to hear His voice. 

When we teach our children to listen, they will in turn learn to listen to God’s voice speaking to them. They will hear the whispers of love and identity. They will hear His leading and calling into purpose. When He says go and do, the outward action developed from an inward posture will lead them straight to Jesus and change generations. 

Consider removing some of the noise to allow space for training in listening. 

Above all, let God train you to listen to His heart as you parent. When we tune into that, our homes are forever changed.